NRLF 


286 

NB5 

1S76 


B    E 


551 


DEPENDENCE  DAY  ORATIONS  AND  POEMS 


JULY   4,   1876. 


HAT    THE    ACE    OWES    TO    AMERICA. 

WILLIAM  M.  EVARTS. 
PAGES  1-12. 

iSE    OF    CONSTITUTIONAL    LIBERTY. 

.   ,  ;  ,|  '.    ,/         /    lilCHARD  S.  STORRS. 

PAGES  12-30. 


ROCRESS    OF    LIBERTY. 


CHARLES  FRANCIS  ADAMS. 
PAGES  30-37. 


HE    ADVANCE    OF    A    CENTURY. 

HENRY  WARD  BEECHER. 
PAGES  37-44. 


CENTURY    OF    SELF-GOVERNMENT. 

ROBERT  C.  WINTHROP. 
PAGES  44-61 . 


HE    NATIONAL    ODE. 


BAYARD  TAYLOR, 
PAGES  61-63. 


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RECOI.LECTIONSOFA  BUSYLIFE: 

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REMINISCENCES    OF     AMEKICAN    POLITICS 
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Extra  No.  33.         Independence,  Day  0 rattens,  July  4,  1876.         25  Cer^s. 


WHAT    THE     AGE     OWES    TO     AMERICA. 

THE   HON.    WILLIAM   M.    EVARTS   AT   PHILADELPHIA. 


I. 
The   event  which   to-day  we   commemorate 

supplies  its  own  reflections  and  enthusiasms  and  brings 
its  own  plaudits.  They  do  not  at  all  bang  on  the  voice  of 
the  speaker,  nor  do  they  greatly  depend  upon  the  con 
tacts  and  associations  of  the  place.  The  Declaration  of 
American  Independence  was,  when  it  occurred,  a  capital 
transaction  in  human  affairs ;  as  such  it  has  kept  its 
place  in  history ;  as  such  it  will  maintain  itself  while 
human  interest  in  human  institutions  shall  endure.  The 
scene  and  the  actors,  for  their  profound  impression  upon 
the  world,  at  the  time  and  ever  since,  have  owed  nothing 
to  dramatic  effects,  nothing  to  epical  exaggerations.  To 
the  eye  there  was  nothing  wonderful,  or  vast,  or  splendid, 
or  pathetic  in  the  movement  or  the  display.  Imagina 
tion  or  art  can  give  no  sensible  grace  or  decoration  to  the 
persons,  the  place,  or  the  performance,  which  made  up 
the  business  of  that  day.  The  worth  and  force  that  be 
long  to  the  agents  and  the  action  rest  wholly  on  the  wis 
dom,  the  courage,  and  the  faith  that  formed  and  exe 
cuted  the  great  design,  and  the  potency  and  permanence 
of  its  operation  upon  the  affairs  of  the  world  which,  as 
foreseen  and  legitimate  consequences,  followed.  The 
dignity  of  the  act  is  the  deliberate,  circumspect,  open, 
and  serene  performance  by  these  men  in  the 
clear  light  of  day,  and  by  a  concurrent  purpose 
of  a  civic  duty,  which  embraced  the  greatest 
hazards  to  themselves  and  to  all  the  people 
from  whom  they  held  this  deputed  discretion,  but  which, 
to  their  sober  judgments,  promised  benefits  to  that 
people  and  their  posterity,  from  generation  to  generation, 
exceeding  these  hazards  and  commensurate  with  its  own 
fitness.  The  question  of  their  conduct  is  to  be  measured 
by  the  actual  weight  and  pressure  of  the  manifold  con 
siderations  which  surrounded  the  subject  before  them, 
and  by  the  abundant  evidence  that  they  comprehended 


their  vastness  and  variety.  By  a  voluntary  and  responsi 
ble  choice  they  willed  to  do  what  was  dene,  and  *a"*st 
without  their  will  would  not  have  been  done.  Thus 
estimated,  the  illustrious  act  covers  all  who  participated 
in  it  with  its  own  renown,  and  makes  them  forever  con 
spicuous  among  men,  as  it  is  forever  famous  among 
events.  And  thus  the  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  our 
Independence,  "  wrote  their  names  where  all  nations 
should  behold  them,  and  all  time  should  not  efface  there." 
It  was,  "  in  the  course  of  human  events,"  intrusted  to 
them  to  determine  whether  the  fullness  of  time  had 
come  when  a  nation  should  be  born  in  a  day.  They 
declared  the  independence  of  a  new  nation  in  the  sense 
in  which  men  declare  emancipation  or  declare  war ;  the 
declaration  created  what  was  declared. 

Famous,  always,  among  men  are  the  founders  of 
States,  and  fortunate  above  all  others  in  such  fame  are 
these,  our  fathers,  whose  combined  wisdom  and  courage 
began  the  great  structure  of  our  national  existence,  and 
laid  sure  the  foundations  of  liberty  and  justice  on  which 
it  rests.  Fortunate,  first,  in  the  clearness  of  their  title 
and  in  the  world's  acceptance  of  their  rightful  claim. 
Fortunate,  next,  in  the  enduring  magnitude  of  the  State 
they  founded  and  the  beneficence  of  its  protection  of  the 
vast  interests  of  human  life  and  happiness  which  have 
here  had  their  home.  Fortunate,  again,  in  the  admiring 
imitation  of  their  work,  which  the  institutions  of  the 
most  powerful  and  most  advanced  nations  more  and 
more  exhibit ;  and,  last  of  all,  fortunate  in  the  full  demon 
stration  of  our  later  time  that  their  work  is  adequate  to 
withstand  the  most  disastrous  storms  of  human  fortunes, 
and  survive  unwrecked,  unshaken,  and  unharmed. 

This  day  has  now  been  celebrated  by  a  great  people, 
at  each  recurrence  of  its  anniversary,  for  a  hundred 
years,  with  every  form  of  ostentatious  joy,  with  every 
demonstration  of  respect  and  gratitude  for  the 


M43605 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


ancestral  virtue  which  gave  it  its  glory,  and 
•with  the  firmest  faith  that  growing  time 
should  neither  obscure  its  luster  nor  reduce  the  ardor  or 
discredit  the  sincerity  of  its  observance.  A  reverent 
spirit  has  explored  the  lives  of  the  men  \vho  took  part  in 
the  great  transaction  ;  has  unfolded  their  characters  and 
exhibited  to  an  admiring  posterity  the  purity  of  their 
motives ;  the  sagacity,  the  bravery,  the  fortitude,  the 
perseverance  which  marked  their  conduct,  and  which  se- 
cuied  the  nr^pe/ity  an  d^  permanence  cf  their  work. 

'•"•••"      •  Vir,  :>::'..: 
GRA£r|i>ij&:Ur;TSji;  w<Hj£*'oF  ITTG. 

Philosop'hy'has  diviued  thV  s'e'crets  *of*all  this  power, 
land  eloquence  emblazoned  the  magnificence  of  all  its  re- 
«ults.  The  heroic  war  which  fought  out  the  acquies 
cence  of  the  Old  World  in  the  independence  of  the  New  ; 
the  manifold  and  masterly  forms  of  noble  character  and 
of  patient  and  serene  wisdom  which  the  great  influences 
of  the  tin.es  begat ;  the  large  and  splendid  scale  on  which 
these  elevated  purposes  were  wrought  out,  and  the  majes 
tic  proportions  to  which  they  have  been  filled  up;  the  un- 
ended  line  of  eventful  progress,  casting  ever  backward  a 
flood  of  light  upon  the  sources  of  the  original  energy,  and 
ever  forward  a  promise  and  a  prophecy  of  unexhausted 
power — all  these  have  been  made  familiar  to  our  people 
by  the  genius  and  the  devotion  of  historians  and  orators. 
The  greatest  statesmen  ol  the  Old  World  for  this  same 
period  of  100  years  have  traced  the  initial  steps  in  these 
'events,  looked  into  the  nature  of  the  institutions 
thus  founded,  weighed  by  the  Old  World  wisdom, 
and  measured  by  recorded  experience,  the  probable  for 
tunes  of  this  new  adventure  on  an  unknown  sea.  This 
circumspect  and  searching  survey  of  our  wide  field  of 
political  and  social  experiment,  no  doubt,  has  brought 
them  a  diversity  of  judgment  as  to  the  past  and  of  ex 
pectation  as  to  the  future.  But  of  the  magnitude  and  the 
novelty  and  the  power  of  the  forces  set  at  work  by  the 
event  we  commemorate,  no  competent  authorities  have 
ever  greatly  differed.  The  cotemporary  judgment  of 
Burke  is  scarcely  an  overstatement  of  the  European 
opinion  of  the  immense  import  of  American  indepen 
dence.  He  declared :  "  A  great  revolution  has  happened 
— a  revolution  made,  not  by  chopping  and  changing  of 
power  in  any  of  the  existing  States,  but  by  the  appear 
ance  of  a  new  State,  of  a  new  species,  in  a  new  part  of 
the  globe.  It  has  made  as  great  a  change  in  all  the  rela 
tions  and  balances  and  gravitations  of  power  as  the  ap 
pearance  of  a  new  planet  would  in  the  system  of  the  solar 
world." 

It  is  easy  to  understand  that  the  rupture  between 
the  Colonies  and  the  mother  country  might  have  worked 
a  result  of  political  independence  that  would  have  in 
volved  no  such  mighty  consequences  as  are  here  so 

strongly  announced  by  the  most  philosophic  statesman 

of  Ms  age.    The  resistance  of  the    Colonies,  which  came 


to  a  head  in  the  revolt,  was  led  in  the  name  and  for 
the  maintenance  of  the  liberties  of  Englishmen,  against 
Parliamentary  usurpation  and  a  subversion  of  the  Brit 
ish  Constitution.  A  triumph  of  those  liberties  might 
have  ended  in  an  emancipation  from  the  rule  of  the 
English  Parliament,  and  a  continued  submission  to  the 
scheme  and  system  of  the  British  monarchy,  with  an 
American  Parliament  adjusted  thereto,  upon  the  Vue 
principles  of  the  English  Constitution.  Whether  this 
new  political  establishment  should  have  maintained 
loyalty  to  the  British  sovereign,  or  should  have  been  or 
ganized  under  a  crown  and  throne  of  its  own,  the  trans 
action  would,  then,  have  had  no  other  importance  than 
such  as  belongs  to  a  dismemberment  of  existing  empire, 
but  with  preservation  of  existing  institutions.  There 
would  have  been,  to  be  sure,  a  "  new  state,"  but  not  "  of 
a  new  species,"  and  that  it  was  "  in  a  new  part  of  the 
globe "  would  have  gone  far  to  make  the  dismember 
ment  but  a  temporary  and  circumstantial  disturbance  in 
the  old  order  of  things.  Indeed,  the  solidity  and  perpe 
tuity  of  that  order  might  have  been  greatly  confirmed  by 
this  propagation  of  the  model  of  the  European  monarchies 
on  the  boundless  regions  of  this  continent.  It  is  pre 
cisely  here  that  the  Declaration  of  Independence  has  its 
immense  importance.  As  a  civil  act,  and  by  the  people's 
decree— and  not  by  the  achievement  of  the  army,  or 
through  military  motives — at  the  first  stage  of  the  con 
flict  it  assigned  a  new  nationality,  with  its  own  institu 
tions,  as  the  civilly  preordained  end  to  be  fought  for  and 
secured.  It  did  not  leave  it  to  be  an  after-fruit  of  trium 
phant  war,  shaped  and  measured  by  military  power,  and 
conferred  by  the  army  on  the  people.  This  assured  at 
the  outset  the  supremacy  of  civil  over  military  author 
ity,  the  subordination  of  the  army  to  the  unarmed  people. 
This  deliberative  choice  of  the  scope  and  goal  of  the  Rev 
olution  made  sure  of  two  things,  which  must 
have  been  always  greatly  in  doubt,  if  military 
reasons  and  events  had  held  the  mastery 
over  the  civil  power.  The  first  was,  that  noth 
ing  less  than  the  independence  of  the  nation,  and  its  sep- 
araiion  from  the  system  of  Europe,  would  be  attained  if 
our  arms  were  prosperous  ;  and  the  second,  that  the  new 
nation  would  always  be  the  mistress  of  its  own  institu 
tions.  This  might  not  have  been  its  fate  had  a  trium 
phant  army  won  the  prize  of  independence,  not  as  a 
task  set  for  it  by  the  people,  and  done  in  its  service,  but 
by  its  own  might,  and  held  by  its  own  title,  and  ao  to  be 
shaped  and  dealt  with  by  its  own  will. 

III. 

OBJECTS  OF  THE  REVOLUTION. 
There  is  the  best  reason  to  think  that  the  Congress 
which  declared  our  independence  gave  its  chief  solici 
tude,  not  to  the  hazards  of  military  failure,  not  to  the 
chance  of  miscarriage  in  the  project  of  separation  from 
Ensrlaud,  but  to  the  grave  responsibility  of  the  military 


What  Ute  Age  Owes  io  America.— Evarts. 


success— of  which  they  made  no  doubt— and  as  to  what 
should  replace,  as  government  to  the  new  nation,  the 
monarchy  of  England,  which  they  considered  as  gone  to 
them  forever  from  the  date  of  the  Declaration. 

Nor  did  this  Congress  feel  any  uncertainty,  either  in 
disposition  or  expectation,  that  the  natural  and  neces 
sary  result  would  preclude  the  formation  of  the  new 
Government  out  of  any  other  materials  than  such  as  were 
to  be  found  in  society  as  established  on  this  side  of  the 
Atlantic.  These  materials  they  foresaw  were  capable  of, 
and  would  tolerate,  only  such  political  establishment  as 
would  maintain  and  perpetuate  the  equality  and  liberty 
always  enjoyed  in  the  several  colonial  communities. 

But  all  these  limitations  upon  what  was  possible  still 
left  a  large  range  of  anxiety  as  to  what  was  probable, 
and  might  become  actual.  One  thing  was  too  essential 
to  be  left  uncertain,  and  the  founders  of  this  nation  de 
termined  that  there  never  should  be  a  moment  when  the 
several  communities  of  the  different  colonies  should  lose 
the  character  of  component  parts  of  one  nation.  By 
their  plantation  and  growth  up  to  the  day  of  the  Declara 
tion  of  Independence  they  were  subjects  of  one  sov 
ereignty,  bound  together  in  one  political  connection, 
parts  of  one  county,  under  one  constitution,  with  one 
destiny.  Accordingly  the  Declaration,  by  its  very  terms, 
made  the  act  of  separation  a  dissolving  by  "  one  people" 
of  "  the  political  bands  that  have  connected  them  with 
another,"  ana  the  proclamation  of  the  right  and  of  the 
fact  of  independent  nationality  was,  "  that  these  United 
Colonies  are,  and  of  right  ought  to  be,  free  and  independ 
ent  States." 

It  was  thus  that,  at  one  breath,  "  independence  and 
union"  were  declared  and  established.  The  confirma 
tion  of  the  first  by  war  and  of  the  second  by  civil  wisdom 
was  but  the  execution  of  the  single  design  which  it  is 
the  glory  of  this  great  instrument  of  our  National  ex 
istence  to  have  framed  and  announced.  The  recognition 
of  our  independence,  first  by  France  and  then  by  Great 
Britain,  the  closer  union  by  the  Articles  of  Confederation, 
and  the  final  unity  by  the  Federal  Constitution  were  all 
but  muniments  of  title  of  that  "  liberty  and  union,  one 
and  inseparable,"  which-  were  proclaimed  at  this  place 
and  on  this  day  100  years  ago,  which  have  been  our  pos 
session  from  that  moment  hitherto,  and  which  we  surely 
avow  shall  be  our  possession  forever. 

Seven  years  of  revolutionary  war  and  twelve  years  of 
consummate  civil  prudence  brought  us,  in  turn,  to  the 
conclusive  peace  of  1783  and  to  the  perfected  Constitu 
tion  of  1787.  Few  chapters  of  the  world's  history  cov 
ering  such  brief  periods  are  crowded  with  so  many  illus 
trious  names  or  made  up  of  events  of  so  deep  and  per 
manent  interest  to  mankind.  I  cannot  stay  to  recall  to 
your  attention  these  characters,  or  these  incidents,  or  to 
renew  the  gratitude  and  applause  with  which  we  never 
f  ease  to  contemplate  them.  It  is  only  their  relation  to 
the  Declaration  of  Independence  itself  that  I  need  to 


insist  upon  and  to  the  new  State  which  it  brought  into 
existence.  In  this  view  these  progressive  processes  were 
but  the  articulation  of  the  members  of  the  State  and  the 
adjustment  of  its  circulation  to  the  new  centers  of  its 
vital  power.  These  processes  tvere  all  implied  and  in 
cluded  in  this  political  creation,  and  were  as  necessary 
and  as  certain,  if  it  were  not  to  languish  and  to  die,  as  in 
any  natural  creature. 

Within  the  hundred  years  whose  flight  in  our  national 
history  we  mark  to-day  we  have  had  occasion  to  corrob 
orate  by  war  both  the  independence  and  the  unity  of  the 
nation.  In  our  war  against  England  for  neutrality  we 
asserted  and  we  established  the  absolute  right  to  be  free 
of  European  entanglements  in  time  of  war  as  well  as  in 
time  of  peace,  and  so  completed  our  independence  of 
Europe.  And  by  the  war  of  the  Constitution— a  war 
within  the  nation — the  bonds  of  our  unity  were  tried  and 
tested,  as  in  a  fiery  furnace,  and  proved  to  be  dependent 
upon  no  shifting  vicissitudes  of  acquiescence,  no  partial 
dissents  or  discontents,  but,  so  far  as  is  predicable  of  hu 
man  fortunes,  irrevocable,  indestructible,  perpetual, 
Casibns  hcec  nullis,  nullo  delebilis  cevo. 

IV. 
OUR    NEW    POLITICAL    SYSTEM. 

We  may  be  quite  sure  that  the  high  resolve  to  stake  the 
futuie  of  a  great  people  uyon  a  system  of  society  and  of 
polity  that  should  dispense  with  the  dogmas,*  the  expe 
rience,  the  traditions,  the  habits,  and  the  sentiments 
upon  which  the  firm  and  durable  fabric  of  the  British 
Constitution  had  been  built  up,  was  not  taken  without  a 
solicitous  and  competent  survey  of  the  history,  the  con 
dition,  the  temper,  and  the  moral  and  intellectual  traits 
of  the  people  for  whom  the  decisive  step  was  taken. 

It  may,  indeed,  be  suggested  that  the  main  body  of  the 
elements,  and  a  large  share  of  the  arrangements,  of  the 
new  government  were  expected  to  be  upon  the  model  of 
the  British  system,  and  that  the  substantial  of  civil  and 
religious  liberty  and  the  institutions  for  their  mainte 
nance  and  defense  were  already  the  possession  of  the 
people  of  England  and  the  birthright  of  the  colonists. 
But  this  consideration  does  not  much  disparage  the  re 
sponsibility  assumed  in  discarding  the  correlative  parts 
of  the  British  Constitution.  I  mean  the  Established 
Church  and  Throne ;  the  permanent  power  of  a  heredi 
tary  peerage ;  the  confinement  of  popular  representa 
tion  to  the  wealthy  and  educated  classes;  and  the  ideas 
of  all  participation  by  the  people  in  their  own  govern 
ment  coining  by  gracious  concession  Iroui  the  royal  pre 
rogative  and  not  by  inherent  right  in  themselves.  In 
deed,  the  counter  consideration,  so  far  as  the  question 
was  to  be  solved  by  experience,  would  be  a  ready  one. 
The  foundation,  and  the  wails,  and  the  roof  of  this  firm 
and  noble  edifice,  it  would  be  said,  are  all  fitly  framed 
together  in  the  substantial  institutions  you  propose  to 
omit  from  your  plan  and  model.  The  convenience  and 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  187C. 


safety  and  freedom,  the  pride  and  happiness  which  the 
inmates  of  this  temple  and  fortress  enjoy,  as  the  rights 
and  liberties  of  Englishmen,  are  only  kept  in  place  and 
play  because  of  the  firm  structure  of  these  ancient 
strongholds  of  religion  and  law,  which  you  now  desert 
and  refuse  to  build  anew. 

Our  fathers  had  formed  their  opinions  upon  wiser  and 
deeper  views  of  man  and  Providence  than  these,  and 
they  had  the  courage  of  their  opinions. 

Tracing  the  progress  of  mankind  in  the  ascending  path 
of  civilization,  enlightenment,  and  moral  and  intellectual 
culture,  they  found  that  the  Divine  ordinance  of  govern 
ment,  in  every  stage  of  the  ascent,  was  adjustable  on 
principles  of  common  reason  to  the  actual  condition  of  a 
people,  and  always  had  for  its  objects,  in  the  benevolent 
counsels  of  the  Divine  wisdom,  the  happiness,  the  ex 
pansion,  the  security,  the  elevation  of  society,  and  the 
redemption  of  man.  They  sought  in  vain  tor  any  title  of 
authority  of  man  over  man,  except  of  superior  capacity 
and  higher  moralit3T.  They  found  the  origin  of  castes 
and  ranks,  and  principalities  and  powers,  temporal  or 
spiritual,  in  this  conception.  They  recognized  the  people 
as  the  structure,  the  temple,  the  fortress,  which  the 
great  Artificer  all  the  while  cared  for  and  built  up.  As 
through  the  long  march  of  time  this  work  advanced,  the 
forms  and  fashions  of  government  seemed  to  them  to  be 
but  the  scaffolding  and  apparatus  by  which  the  develop 
ment  of  it  people's  greatness  was  shaped  and  sustained. 
Satisfied  that  the  people  whose  institutions  were  now  to 
be  projected  had  reached  all  that  measure  of  strength 
and  fitness  of  preparation  for  self-government  which  old 
institutions  could  give,  they  fearlessly  seized  the  happy 
opportunity  to  clothe  the  people  with  the  majestic  attri 
butes  of  their  own  sovereignty,  and  consecrate  them  to 
the  administration  of  their  own  priesthood. 

The  repudiation  by  England  of  the  spiritual  power  of 
Rome  at  the  Reformation  was  by  every  estimate  a  stu 
pendous  innovation  in  the  rooted  allegiance  of  the 
people,  a  profound  disturbance  of  all  adjustments  of  au 
thority.  But  Henry  VIII.,  when  he  displaced  the  domin 
ion  of  the  Pope,  proclaimed  himself  the  head  of  the 
Church.  The  overthrow  of  the  ancient  monarchy  of 
France  by  the  fierce  triumph  of  an  enraged  people  was  a 
catastrophe  that  shook  the  arrangements  of  society  from 
center  to  circumference.  But  Napoleon,  when  he  pushed 
aside  the  royal  line  of  St.  Louis,  announced,  "I  am  the 
people  crowned,"  and  set  up  a  plebeian  Emperor  as  the 
impersonation  and  depositary  in  him  and  his  line  forever 
of  the  people's  sovereignty.  The.  founders  of  our  Com 
monwealth  conceived  that  the  people  of  these  colonies 
needed  no  interception  of  the  supreme  control  of  their 
own  affairs,  no  conciliations  of  mere  names  and  images 
of  power  from  which  the  pith  and  vigor  of  authority  had 
departed.  They,  therefore,  did  not  hesitate  to  throw 
down  the  partitions  of  power  and  right  and  break  up  the 
distributive  shares  in.  authority  of  ranks  and  orders  of 


men  which  indeed  had  ruled  and  advanced  the  develop 
inent  of  society  in  civil  and  religious  liberty,  but  might 
well  be  neglected  when  the  protected  growth  was  as 
sured  and  all  tutelary  supervision  for  this  reason  hence 
forth  could  only  be  obstructive  and  incongruous. 

V. 
ENGLISH  AND  FRENCH  REPUBLICS. 

A  glance  at  the  fate  of  the  English  essay  at  a  com 
monwealth,  which  preceded,  and  to  the  French  experi 
ment  at  a  republic,  which  followed  our  own  institution 
"  of  a  new  State  of  a  new  species,"  will  show  the  marvel 
ous  wisdom  of  our  ancestors,  which  struck  the  line 
between  too  little  and  too  much ;  which  walked  by  faith 
indeed  for  things  invisible,  but  yet  by  sight  for  things 
visible ;  which  dared  to  appropriate  everything  to  the 
people  which  had  belonged  to  Caesar,  but  to  assume  for 
mortals  nothing  that  belonged  to  God. 

No  doubt  it  was  a  deliberation  of  prodigious  difficulty, 
and  a  decision  of  infinite  moment,  which  should  settle 
the  new  institutions  of  England  after  the  execution  of 
the  King,  and  determine  whether  they  should  be  popular 
or  monarchical.  The  problem  was  too  vast  for  Cromwell 
and  the  great  men  who  stood  about  him,  and,  halting 
between  the  only  possible  opinions,  they  simply  robbed 
the  throne  of  stability,  without  giving  to  the  people  the 
choice  of  their  rulers.  Had  Cromwell  assumed  the  state 
and  style  of  King,  and  assigned  the  constitutional  limits 
of  prerogative,  the  statesmen  of  England  would  have 
anticipated  the  establishment  of  1688,  and  saved  the 
disgraces  of  the  intervening  record.  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  ever-recurring  consent  of  the  people  in  vesting 
the  Chief  Magistracy  had  been  accepted  for  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  State,  the  revolution  would  have  been  intelli 
gible,  and  might  have  proved  permanent.  But  what  a 
"  Lord  Protector  "  was  nobody  knew,  and  what  he  might 
grow  to  be  everybody  wondered  and  feared.  The  aris 
tocracy  could  endure  no  dignity  above  them  less  than  a 
king's.  The  people  knew  the  measure  and  the  title  of 
the  chartered  liberties  which  had  been  wrested  or 
yielded  from  the  King's  prerogative ;  but  what  the  divis 
ion  between  them  and  a  Lord  Protector  would  be  no  one 
could  forecast.  A  brief  fluttering  between  the  firmament 
above  and  the  firm  earth  beneath,  with  no  poise  with 
either,  and  the  discordant  scheme  was  rolled  away  as  a 
scroll.  A  hundred  years  afterward  Montesquieu  derided 
"this  impotent  effort  of  the  English  to  establish  a  de 
mocracy,"  and  divined  the  true  cause  of  its  failure.  The 
supreme  place,  no  longer  sacred  by  the  divinity  that 
doth  hedge  about  a  king,  irritated  the  ambitious  to  which 
it  was  inaccessible,  except  by  faction  and  violence. 
"The  Government  was  incessantly  changed,  and  the 
astonished  people  sought  for  democracy  and  found  it 
nowhere.  Alter  much  violence  and  many  shocks  atfd* 
blows,  they  were  fain  to  fall  back  upon  the  same  govern 
ment  they  had  overthrows. " 


IVIiat  the  Age  Owes  to  ADI  erica.— Evarts. 


The  English  experiment  to  make  a  commonwealth 
•without  sinking  its  foundations  into  the  firm  bed  of 
popular  sovereignty,  necessarily  failed.  Its  example 
and  its  lesson,  unquestionably,  were  of  the  greatest  ser 
vice  in  sobering  the  spirit  of  English  reform  in  govern 
ment,  to  the  solid  establishment  of  constitutional  mon 
archy,  on  the  expulsion  of  the  Stuarts,  and  in  giving 
courage  to  the  statesmen  of  the  American  Revolution  to 
push  on  to  the  solid  establishment  of  republican  govern 
ment,  with  the  consent  of  the  people  as  its  every -day 
-working  force. 

But  if  the  English  experiment  stumbled  in  its  logic 
by  not  going  far  enough,  the  Frencii  philosophers  came 
to  greater  disaster  by  overpassing  the  lines  which  mark 
the  limits  of  human  authority  and  human  liberty,  when 
they  undertook  to  redress  the  disordered  balance  between 
people  and  rulers,  and  renovate  the  Government  of 
France.  To  the  wrath  of  the  people  against  kings  and 
priests  they  gave  free  course,  not  only  to  the  overthrow 
of  the  establishment  of  the  Church  and  State,  but  to  the 
destruction  of  religion  and  society.  They  deified  man, 
and  thought  to  raise  a  tower  of  man's  building,  as  of  old 
on  the  plain  of  Shinar,  which  should  overtop  the  bat 
tlements  of  heaven,  and  frame  a  constitution  of  human 
affairs  that  should  displace  the  providence  of  God.  A 
contusion  of  tongues  put  an  end  to  this  ambition.  And 
now  out  of  all  its  evil  have  come  the  salutary  checks 
and  discipline  in  freedom,  which  have  brought  passion 
ate  and  fervid  France  to  the  scheme  and  frame  of  a 
sober  and  firm  republic  like  our  own,  and,  we  may  hope, 
us  durable. 

VI. 

OUR  DEBT  TO  THE  MEN  OF  1776. 

How  much,  then,  hung  upon  the  decision  of  the  great 
day  we  celebrate,  and  upon  the  wisdom  and  the  will  of 
the  men  who  fixed  the  immediate,  and  if  so,  the  present 
fortunes  of  this  people.  If  the  body,  the  spirit,  the 
texture  of  our  political  life  had  not  been  collectively  de 
clared  on  this  day,  who  can  be  bold  enough  to  say  when 
and  how  independence,  liberty,  union*  would  have  been 
combined,  confirmed,  assured  to  this  people  ?  Behold, 
now,  the  greatness  of  our  debt  to  this  ancestry,  and  the 
fountain,  as  from  a  rock  smitten  in  the  wilderness,  from 
which  the  stream  of  this  nation's  growth  and  power 
takes  its  source.  For  it  is  not  alone  in  the  memory  of 
their  wisdom  and  virtues  that  the  founders  of  a  State 
transmit  and  perpetuate  their  influences  in  its  lasting 
fortunes,  and  shape  the  character  and  purposes  of  its 
future  rulers.  "  In  the  birth  of  societies,"  says 
Montesquieu,  "  it  is  the  chiefs  of  a  State  that  ma7*e  its 
institutions ;  and  afterward  it  is  these  institutions  that 
form  the  chiefs  of  the  State." 

And  what  was  this  people  and  what  their  traits  and 
training  that  could  justify  this  congress  of  their  great 
•men  in  promulgating  the  profound  views  of  government 


and  human  nature  which  the  Declaration  embodies  and 
expecting  their  acceptance  as  "  self-evident  ?"  How  had 
their  lives  been  disciplined  and  how  their  spirits  pre 
pared  that  the  new-launched  ship,  freighted  with  all 
their  fortunes,  could  be  trusted  to  their  guidance  with 
no  other  chart  or  compass  than  these  abstract  truths? 
What  warrant  was  there  for  the  confidence  that  upon 
these  plain  precepts  of  equality  of  right,  community'  of 
interest,  reciprocity  of  duty,  a  polity  could  be  framed 
which  might  safely  discard  Egyptian  mystery,  and  He 
brew  reverence,  and  Grecian  subtlety,  and  Roman 
strength — dispense,  even,  with  English  traditions  of 

"  Primogenity  and  due  of  birth, 

Prerogative  of  age,  crowns,  scepters,  laurels." 

To  these  questions  the  answer  was  ready  and  sufficient. 
The  delegates  to  this  immortal  assembly,  speaking  for 
the  whole  country  and  for  the  respective  colonies,  their 
constituents,  might  well  say : 

"  What  we  are,  such  are  this  people.  We  are  not  here 
as  volunteers,  but  as  their  representatives.  We  have 
been  designated  by  no  previous  official  station,  taken 
from  no  one  employment  or  condition  of  life,  chosen 
from  the  people  at  large  because  they  cannot  assemble 
in  person,  and  selected  because  they  know  our  senti 
ments,  and  we  theirs,  on  the  momentous  question  which 
our  deliberations  are  to  decide.  They  know  that  the  re 
sult  of  all  hangs  on  the  intelligence,  the  courage,  the  con 
stancy,  the  spirit  of  the  people  themselves.  If  these  have 
risen  to  a  hight,  and  grown  to  a  strength  and  unanimity 
that  our  judgment  measures  as  adequate  to  the  struggle 
for  independence  and  the  whole  sum  of  their  liberties, 
they  will  accept  that  issue  and  follow  that  lead.  They 
have  taken  up  arms  to  maintain  their  rights,  and  will 
not  lay  them  down  till  those  rights  are  assured.  What 
the  nature  and  sanctions  of  this  security  are  to  be  they 
understand  must  be  determined  by  united  counsels  and 
concerted  action.  These  they  have  deputed  us  to  settle 
and  proclaim,  and  this  we  have  done  to-day.  What  we 
have  declared  the  people  will  avow  and  confirm.  Hence 
forth  it  is  to  this  people  a  war  for  the  defense  of  their 
united  independence  against  its  overthrow  by  foreign 
arms.  Of  that  war  there  can  be  but  one  issue.  And  for 
the  rest,  as  to  the  Constitution  of  the  new  State,  its 
species  is  disclosed  by  its  existence.  The  condition  of 
the  people  is  equal,  they  have  the  habits  of  freemen  and 
possess  the  institutions  of  liberty.  When  the  political 
connection  with  the  parent  State  is  dissolved  they  will 
be  self-governing  and  self-governed  of  necessity.  As  all 
governments  in  this  world,  good  and  bad,  liberal  or  des 
potic,  are  of  men,  by  men,  and  for  men,  this  new  State, 
having  no  castes  or  ranks,  or  degrees  discriminating 
among  men  in  its  population,  becomes  at  once  a  govern 
ment  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  and  for  the  people.  So 
it  must  remain,  unless  foreign  conquest  or  domestic  usur 
pation  shall  change  it.  Whether  it  shall  be  a  just,  wise, 


t> 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


or  prosperous  government,  it  must  be  a  popular  govern 
ment,  and  correspond  with  the  wisdom,  justice,  and  for 
tunes  of  the  people." 

VII. 
ATTRACTIONS    OF    SELF-GOVERNMENT. 

And  so  this  people,  of  various  roots  and  kindred  of  the 
Old  World— settled  and  transfused  in  their  cisatlantic 
home  into  harmonious  fellowship  in  the  sentiments,  the 
interests,  the  habits,  the  affections  which  develop  and  sus 
tain  a  love  of  country— were  committed  to  the  common 
fortunes  which  should  attend  an  absolute  trust  in  the 
primary  relations  between  man  and  his  fellows  and  be 
tween  man  and  his  Maker.  This  Northern  Continent  of 
America  had  been  opened  and  prepared  for  the  trans 
plantation  of  the  full-grown  manhood  of  the  highest  civil 
ization  of  the  Old  World  to  a  place  where  it  could  be  free 
from  mixture  or  collision  with  competing  or  hostile  ele 
ments,  and  separated  from  the  weakness  and  the  burdens 
which  it  would-leave  behind.  The  impulses  and  attrac 
tions  which  moved  the  emigration  and  directed  it  hither, 
various  in  form,  yet  had  so  much  a  common  character  as 
to  merit  the  description  of  being  public,  elevated,  moral, 
or  religious.  They  included  the  desire  of  new  and  better 
opportunities  for  institutions  consonant  with  the  dignity 
of  human  nature  and  with  the  immortal  and  infinite  rela 
tions  of  the  race.  In  the  language  of  the  times,  the  search 
for  civil  and  religious  liberty  animated  the  Pil 
grims,  the  Puritans,  and  the  Churchmen,  the  Pres 
byterians,  the  Catholics,  and  the  Quakers— the  Hugue 
nots,  the  Dutch,  and  the  Walloons— the  Waldeneses,  the 
Germans,  and  the  Swedes,  in  their  several  migrations 
which  made  up  the  colonial  population.  Their  experi 
ence  and  fortunes  here  had  done  nothing  to  reduce, 
everything  to  confirm,  the  views  and  traits  which  brought 
them  hither.  To  sever  all  political  relations,  then,  with 
Europe,  seemed  to  these  people  but  the  realization  of  the 
purposes  which  had  led  them  across  the  ocean— but  the 
one  thing  needful  to  complete  this  continent  for  their 
home,  and  to  give  the  absolute  assurance  of  that  higher 
life  which  they  wished  to  lead.  The  preparation  of  the 
past  and  the  enthusiasms  of  the  future  conspired  to 
favor  the  project  of  self-government  and  invest  it  with  a 
moral  grandeur  which  furnished  the  best  omens  and  the 
best  guarantees  for  its  prosperity.  Instead  of  a  capri 
cious  and  giddy  exaltation  of  spirit,  as  at  new-gained 
liberty,  a  sober  and  solemn  sense  of  the  larger  trust  and 
duty  took  possession  of  their  souls  ;  as  if  the  Great 
Master  had  found  them  faithful  over  a  few  things,  and 
had  now  made  them  rulers  over  many. 

These  feelings,  common  to  the  whole  population,  were 
not  of  sudden  origin  and  were  not  romantic,  nor  had  they 
any  tendency  to  evaporate  in  noisy  boasts  or  run  wild  in 
air-drawn  projects.  The  difference  between  equality  and 
privilege,  between  civil  rights  and  capricious  favors,  be 
tween  freedom  of  conscience  and  persecution  for  con 


science'  sake,  were  not  matters  of  most  debate  or  ab 
stract  conviction  with  our  countrymen.  The  story 
of  these  battles  of  our  race  was  the  warm  and 
living  memory  of  their  forefathers'  siare  in  them,  for 
which,  "  to  avoid  insufferable  grievances  at  home,  they 
had  been  enforced  by  heaps  to  leave  their  native  coun 
tries."  They  proposed  to  settle  forever  the  question 
whether  such  grievances  should  possibly  befall  them  or 
their  posterity.  They  knew  no  plan  so  simple,  so  com 
prehensive,  or  so  sure  to  this  end  as  to  solve  all  the  minor 
difficulties  in  the  government  of  society  by  a  radical 
basis  for  its  source,  a  common  field  for  its  operation,  and 
an  authentic  and  deliberate  method  for  consulting  and 
enforcing  the  will  of  the  people  as  the  sole  authority  of 
the  State. 

By  this  wisdom  they  at  least  would  shift,  within  the 
sphere  of  government,  the  continuous  warfare  of  human 
nature,  on  the  field  of  good  and  evil,  right  and  wrong, 

"  Between  whose  endless  jar  justice  resides," 
from  conflicts  of  the  strength  of  the  many  against  the 
craft  of  the  few.  They  would  gain  the  advantage  of  sup 
plying  as  the  reason  of  the  State,  the  reason  of  the  peo 
ple,  and  decide  by  the  moral  and  intellectual  influences 
of  instruction  and  persuasion,  the  issue  of  who  should 
make  and  who  administer  the  laws.  This  involved  no 
pretensions  of  the  perfection  of  human  nature,  nor  did  it 
assume  that  at  other  times,  or  under  other  circumstances 
they  would  themselves  have  been  capable  of  self-govern 
ment  ;  or,  that  other  people  then  were,  or  ever  would  be 
so  capable.  Their  knowledge  of  mankind  showed  them 
that  there  would  be  faults  and  crimes  so  long  as  there 
were  men.  Their  faith  taught  them  that  this  corruptible 
would  put  on  incorruption  only  when  this  mortal  should 
put  on  immortality.  Nevertheless  they  believed  in  man 
and  trusted  in  God,  and  on  these  imperishable  supports 
they  thought  they  might  rest  civil  government  for  a  peo 
ple  who  had  these  living  conceptions  wrought  into  their 
own  characters  and  lives. 

The  past  and  the  present  are  the  only  means  by  which 
man  foresees  or  shapes  the  future.  Upon  the  evidence 
of  the  past,  the  ^contemplation  of  the  present  of  this 
people,  our  statesmen  were  willing  to  commence  a  sys 
tem  which  must  continually  draw,  for  its  sustenance  and 
growth,  upon  the  virtue  and  vigor  of  the  people.  From 
this  virtue  and  this  vigor  it  can  alone  be  nourished  ;  it 
must  decline  in  their  decline  and  rot  in  their  decay. 
They  traced  this  vigor  and  virtue  to  inexhaustible 
springs.  And,  as  the  unspent  heat  of  a  lava  soil,  quick 
ened  by  the  returning  Summers,  through  the  vintages  of 
a  thousand  years,  will  still  glow  in  the  grape  and  sparkle 
in  the  wine,  so  will  the  exuberant  forces  of  a  race  sup 
ply  an  unstinted  vigor  to  mark  the  virtues  of  immense 
populations  and  to  the  remotest  generations. 

To  the  frivolous  philosophy  of  human  life  which  makes 
all  the  world  a  puppet  show,  and  history  a  book  of  anec 
dotes,  the  moral  warfare  which  fills  up  the  life  of  niair 


What  the  Age  Owes 

and  the  record  of  his  race  seems  as  unreal  and  as  aimless 
as  tliQ  conflicts  of  the  glittering  hosts  upon  an  airy  Held, 
whose  display  lights  up  the  fleeting  splendors  of  a 
northern  night.  But  free  government  for  a  great  people 
nover  comes  from  or  gets  aid  from  such  philosophers. 
To  a  true  spiritual  discernment  there  are  few  things 
more  real,  few  things  more  substantial,  few  things  more 
likely  to  endure  in  this  world  than  human  thoughts, 
human  passions,  human  interests,  thus  molten  into  the 
frame  and  model  of  our  State.  "  O  morem  prceclaram, 
disciplinamque,  quam  a  majoribus  accepirmis,  si  quidem 
ieneremus  !" 

I  have  made  no  account,  as  unsuitable  to  the  occasion, 
of  the  distribution  of  the  national  power  between  the 
General  and  the  State  governments,  or  of  the  special  ar 
rangements  of  executive  authority,  of  legislatures,  courts, 
and  magistracies,  whether  of  the  General  or  of  the  State 
establishments.  Collectively  they  form  the  body  and  the 
frame  of  a  complete  government  for  a  great,  opulent,  and 
powerful  people,  occupying  vast  regions,  and  embracing 
in  their  possessions  a  wide  range  of  diversity  of  climate, 
of  soil,  and  of  all  the  circumstantial  influences  of  ex 
ternal  nature.  I  have  pointed  your  attention  to  the  prin 
ciple  and  the  spirit  of  the  government  for  which  all  this 
frame  and  body  exists,  to  which  they  are  subservient, 
and  to  whose  mastery  they  must  conform.  The  life  of 
the  natural  body  is  the  blood,  and  the  circulation  of  the 
moral  and  intellectual  forces  and  impulses  of  the  body 
politic  shapes  and  molds  the  national  life.  I  have 
touched,  therefore,  upon  the  traits  that  determined  this 
national  life,  as  to  be  of,  from,  and  for  the  people,  and 
not  of,  from,  or  for  any  rank,  grade,  part,  or  section  of 
them.  In  these  traits  are  found  the  "  ordinances,  consti 
tutions,  and  customs"  by  a  wise  choice,  of  which  the 
founders  of  States  may,  Lord  Bacon  says, "  sow  greatness 
to  their  posterity  and  succession." 

And  now,  after  a  century  of  growth,  of  trial,  of  expe 
rience,  of  observation,  and  of  demonstration,  we  are 
met,  on  the  spot  and  on  the  date  of  the  great  Declaration 
to  compare  our  age  with  that  of  our  fathers,  our  struc 
ture  with  their  foundation,  our  intervening  history  and 
present  condition  with  their  faith  and  prophecy.  That 
"  respect  to  the  opinion  of  mankind,"  in  attention  to 
which  our  statesmen  framed  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence,  we,  too,  acknowledge  as  a  sentiment  most  fit 
to  influence  us  in  our  commemorative  gratulations  to 
day. 

VITI. 

RESULTS  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

To  this  opinion  of  mankind,  then,  how  shall  we  answer 
the  questioning  of  this  day  ?  How  have  the  vigor  and 
success  of  the  country's  warfare  comported  with  the 
sounding  phrase  of  the  great  manifesto  1  Has  the  new 
nation  been  able  to  hold  its  territory  on  the  eastern  rim 
of  the  Continent,  or  has  covetous  Europe  driven  in  its 


to  America. — Evarts.  7 

boundaries,  or  internal  dissensions  dismembered  its  in 
tegrity?  Have  its  numbers  kept  pace  with  natural 
incrpase,  or  have  the  mother  countries  received  back  to 
the  shelter  of  firmer  institutions  the  repentant  tide  of 
emigration?  or  have  the  woes  of  unstable  society  dis* 
tressed  and  reduced  the  shrunken  population  ?  Has  tha 
free  suffrage,  as  a  quicksand,  loosened  the  foundations 
of  power  and  undermined  the  pillars  of  the  State  \ 
Has  the  free  press,  with  illimitable  sweep,  blown, 
down  the  props  and  buttresses  of  order  and  authority  in 
Government,  driven  before  its  wind  the  barriers  which 
fence  in  society,  and  unroofed  the  homes  which  once 
were  castles  against  the  intrusion  of  a  King?  Has  free 
dom  in  religion  ended  in  freedom  from  religion  ?  and  in 
dependence  by  law  run  into  independence  of  law  ?  Have 
free  schools,  by  too  much  learning,  made  the  people 
mad?  Have  manners  declined,  letters  languished,  art- 
faded,  wealth  deca3red,  public  spirit  withered  ?  Have 
other  nations  shunned  the  evil  example,  and  heid  aloof 
from  its  infection  ?  Or  have  reflection  and  hard  fortune 
dispelled  the  illusions  under  which  th:s  people  "  burned, 
incense  to  vanity,  and  stumbled  in  their  ways  from  the 
ancient  paths  ?"  Have  they,  fleeing  from  the  double 
destruction  which  attends  folly  and  arrogance,  restored 
the  throne,  rebuilt  the  altar,  relaid  the  foundations  of 
society,  and  again  taken  shelter  in  the  old  protections 
against  the  perils,  shocks,  and  changes  in  human  affairs, 
which 

"  Divert  and  crack,  rend  and  deracinate 

The  unity  and  married  calm  of  States 

Quite  from  their  fixture  1" 

Who  can  recount  in  an  hour  what  has  been  done  in  a 
century,  on  so  wide  a  field,  and  in  all  its  multitudinous 
aspects?  Yet  I  may  not  avoid  insisting  upon  some 
decisive  lineaments  of  the  material,  social,  and  political 
dtvelopment  of  our  country  which  the  record  of  the- 
hundred  years  displays,  and  thus  present  to  "  the  opinion 
of  mankind,"  for  its  generous  judgment,  our  nation  as  it 
is  to-day— our  land,  our  people,  and  our  laws.  And, 
first,  we  notice  the  wide  territory  to  which  we  have 
steadily  pushed  on  our  limits.  Lines  of  climate  mark  our 
boundaries  north  and  south,  and  two  oceans  east  and 
west.  The  space  between,  speaking  by  and  large,  covers 
the  whole  temperate  zone  of  the  Continent,  and  in  area 
measures  near  tenfold  the  possessions  of  the  thirteen 
colonies  ;  the  natural  features,  the  climate,  the  produc 
tions,  the  influences  of  the  outward  world,  are  all  im 
plied  in  the  immensity  of  this  domain,  for  they  embrace 
all  that  the  goodness  and  the  power  of  God  have  planned 
for  so  large  a  share  of  the  habitable  globe.  The  steps  of 
the  successive  acquisitions,  the  impulses  which  assisted, 
and  the  motives  which  retarded  the  expansion  of  our 
territory ;  the  play  of  the  competing  elements  in  our 
civilization  and  their  incessant  struggle  each  to  outrun 
the  other ;  the  irrepressible  conflict  thus  nursed  in  the 
bosom  of  the  State;  the  lesson  in  humility  and  patience, 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4.  187G. 


•'in  charity  for  all  and  malice  toward  none,"  which  the 
study  of  the  manifest  designs  of  Providence  so  plainly 
teach  us— these  may  well  detain  us  for  a  moment's 
illustration. 

IX. 

EMANCIPATION. 

And  this  calls  attention  to  that  ingredient  in  the  popu 
lation  of  this  country  which  came,  not  from  the  culmi 
nated  pride  of  Europe,  but  from  the  abject  despondency 
of  Africa.  A  race  discriminated  from  all  the  converging 
streams  of  immigration  which  I  have  named  by  inefface 
able  distinctions  of  nature ;  which  was  brought  hither  by 
a  forced  migration  and  into  slavery*  while  all  others 
came  by  choice  and  for  greater  liberty;  a  race  unrepre 
sented  in  the  Congress  which  issued  the  Declaration  of 
Independence,  but  now,  in  the  persons  of  4,000,000  of 
our  countrymen  raised,  by  the  power  of  the  great  truths 
then  declared,  as  it  were  from  the  dead,  and  rejoicing  in 
one  country  and  the  same  constituted  liberties  with  our 
selves. 

In  August,  1620,  a  Dutch  slave-ship  landed  her  freight 
in  Virginia,  completing  her  voyage  soon  after  that  of  the 
Mayflower  commenced.  Both  ships  were  on  the  ocean 
at  the  same  time,  both  sought  our  shores,  and  planted 
their  seeds  of  liberty  and  slavery  to  grow  together  on 
this  chosen  field  until  the  harvest.  Until  the  separation 
from  England  the  several  colonies  attracted  each  their 
own  emigration,  and  from  the  sparseness  of  the  popula 
tion,  both  in  the  Northern  and  Southern  colonies  and 
the  policy  of  England  in  introducing  African  slavery, 
wherever  it  miarht,  in  all  of  them,  the  institution  of 
slavery  did  not  raise  a  definite  and  firm  line  of  division 
between  the  tides  of  population  which  set  in  upon  New- 
England  and  Virgina  from  the  Old  World,  and  from  them 
later,  as  from  new  points  of  departure,  were  diffused  over 
the  continent.  The  material  interests  of  slavery  had  not 
become  very  strong,  and  in  its  moral  aspects  no  sharp 
division  of  sentiment  had  yet  shown  itself.  But  when 
unity  and  independence  of  government  were  accepted 
by  the  colonies,  we  shall  look  in  vain  for  any  adequate 
barrier  against  the  natural  attraction  of  the  softer  cli 
mate  and  rich  productions  of  the  South,  which  could 
keep  the  Northern  population  in  their  harder  climate 
and  on  their  less  grateful  soil,  except  the  repugnancy  of 
the  two  systems  of  free  and  slave  labor  to  commixture. 
Out  of  this  grew  the  impatient,  and  apparently  prema 
ture,  invasion  of  the  Western  wilds,  pushing  constantly 
onward,  in  parallel  lines,  the  outposts  of  the  two  rival 
interests.  What  greater  enterprise  did  for  the  Northern 
people  in  stimulating  this  movement  was  more  than 
supplied  to  the  Southern  by  the  pressing  necessity 
for  new  lands,  which  the  requirements  of  the  sys 
tem  of  slave  cultivation  imposed.  Under  the  opera 
tion  of  these  causes  the  political  divisions  of  the  eountry 
built  up  a  wall  of  partition  ranuiug  cust  and  wost,  -with 


the  novel  consequences  of  the  "  Border  States"  of  the 
country  being  ranged,  not  on  our  foreign  boundaries,  but 
on  this  middle  line,  drawn  between  the  free  and  slave 
States.  The  successive  acquisitions  of  territory,  by  the 
Louisiana  purchase,  by  the  annexation  of  Texas,  and  by 
the  Treaty  with  Mexico,  were  ail  in  the  interest  of  the 
Southern  policy,  and,  as  such,  all  suspected  or  resisted 
by  the  rival  interest  in  the  North.  On  the  other  hand, 
all  schemes  or  tendencies  toward  the  enlargement  of  our 
territory  on  the  north  were  discouraged  and  defeated  by 
the  South.  At  length,  with  the  immense  influx  of  foreign 
immigration,  reenforcing  the  flow  of  population,  the 
streams  of  free  labor  shot  across  the  continent.  The  end 
was  reached.  The  bounds  of  our  habitation  were  se 
cured.  The  Pacific  possessions  became  ours,  and  the 
discovered  gold  rapidly  peopled  them  from  the  hives  of 
free  labor.  The  rival  energies  and  ambitions  which  had 
fed  the  thirst  for  territory  had  served  their  pui  pose,  in 
completing  and  assuring  the  domain  of  the  nation.  The 
partition  wall  of  slavery  was  thrown  down-;  the  line  of 
Border  States  obliterated  ;  those  who  had  battled  for 
territory,  as  an  extension  and  perpetuation  of  slavery, 
and  those  who  fought  against  its  enlargement,  as  a  dis 
paragement  and  a  danger  to  liberty,  were  alike  con 
founded. 

Those  who  feared  undue  and  precipitate  expansion  of 
our  possessions,  as  loosening  the  ties  of  union,  and  those 
who  desired  it,  as  a  step  toward  dissolution,  have  suf 
fered  a  common  discomfiture.  The  immense  social  and 
political  forces  which  the  existence  of  slavery  in  this 
country,  acd  the  invincible  repugnance  to  it  of  the  vital 
principles  of  our  state,  together,  generated,  have  had 
their  play  upon  the  passions  and  the  interests  of  this 
people,  have  formed  the  basis  of  parties,  divided  sects, 
agitated  and  invigorated  the  popular  mind,  inspired  the 
eloquence,  inflamed  the  zeal,  informed  the  understand 
ings,  and  fired  the  hearts  of  three  generations.  At  last 
the  dread  debate  escaped  all  bounds  of  reason,  and  the 
nation  in  arms  solved,  by  the  appeal  of  war,  what  was 
too  hard  for  civil  wisdom.  With  our  territory  uuinuti- 
lated,  our  Constitution  uncorrupted,  a  united,  people,  in 
the  last  years  of  the  century,  crowns  with  new  glory 
the  immortal  truths  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence 
by  the  emancipation  of  a  race. 

X. 

PROMISE  OF  NATIONAL  LONGEVITY. 

I  find,  then,  in  the  method  and  the  results  of  the  cen 
tury's  progress  of  the  nation  in  this  amplification  of  its 
domain,  sure  promise  of  the  duration  of  the  body  politic, 
whose  growth  to  these  vast  proportions  has,  as  yet,  but 
laid  out  the  ground  plan  of  the  structure.  For  I  find 
the  vital  forces  of  the  free  society  and  the  people's  gov 
ernment,  here  founded,  have  by  their  own  vigor  made 
this  a  naluraJ  crowtli.  Strength  ?iui  syf  uauj  fc»ve 


What  the  Age  Owes  to  America — Evarls. 


knit  together  the  great  frame  as  its  bulk  increased,  and 
the  spirit  of  the  nation  animates  the  whole : 

"totarnqtie,  infusa  per  artna, 

Mensagitat  molem,  et  niagnose,  corpore  miscet." 

We  turn  now  from  the  survey  of  this  vast  territory, 
•which  the  closing  century  has  consolidated  and  confirmed 
as  the  ample  home  for  a  nation,  to  exhibit  the  greatness 
in  numbers,  the  spirit,  the  character,  the  port  and  mien 
of  the  people  that  dwell  in  this  secure  habitation.  That 
in  these  years,  our  population  has  steadily  advanced,  till 
it  counts  40,000,000  intead  of  3,COO,000,  bears  witness, 
not  to  be  disparaged  or  gainsaid,  to  the  general  congruity 
of  our  social  and  civil  institutions  with  the  happiness 
and  prosperity  of  man.  But  if  we  consider  further  the 
variety  and  magnitude  of  foreign  elements  to  which  we 
have  been  hospitable,  and  their  ready  fusion  with  the 
earlier  stocks,  we  have  new  evidence  of  strength  and 
vivid  force  in  our  population,  which  we  may  not  refuse 
to  admire.  The  disposition  and  the  capacity  thus  shown 
give  warrant  of  a  powerful  society.  "  All  nations,"  says 
Lord  Bacon,  "  that  are  liberal  of  naturalization  are  fit  for 
empire." 

Wealth  in  its  mass,  and  still  more  in  its  tenure  and 
diffusion,  is  a  measure  of  the  condition  of  a  people  which 
touches  both  its  energy  and  morality.  Wealth  has  no 
source  but  labor.  "Life  has  given  nothing  valuable  to 
man  without  great  labor."  This  is  as  true  now  as  when 
Horace  wrote  it.  The  prodigious  growth  of  wealth  in 
this  country  is  not  only,  therefore,  a  signal  mark  of  pros 
perity,  but  proves  industry,  persistency,  thrift  as  the 
habits  of  the  people.  Accumulation  of  wealth,  too, 
requires  and  imports  security,  as  well  as  unfettered 
activity ;  and  thus  it  is  a  fair  criterion  of  sobriety  and 
justice  in  a  people,  certainly,  when  the  laws  and  their 
execution  rest  wholly  in  their  hands.  A  careless  observa 
tion  of  the  crimes  and  frauds  which  attack  prosperity, 
in  the  actual  condition  of  our  society,  and  the  imperfec 
tion  of  our  means  for  their  prevention  and  redress,  leads 
sometimes  to  an  unfavorable  comparison  between  the 
present  and  the  past,  in  this  country,  as  respects  the 
probity  of  the  people.  No  doubt  covetousness  has  not 
ceased  in  the  world,  and  thieves  still  break  through  and 
steal.  But  the  better  test  upon  this  point  is  the  vast 
profusion  of  our  wealth  and  the  infinite  trust  shown  by 
the  manner  in  which  it  is  invested.  It  is  not  too  much 
to  say  that  in  our  times,  and  conspicuously  in  our 
country,  a  larere  share  of  every  man's  property  is  in  other 
men's  keeping  and  management,  unwatched  and  beyond 
personal  control.  This  confidence  of  man  in  man  is  ever 
increasing,  measured  by  our  practical  conduct,  and  re 
futes  these  disparagements  of  the  general  morality. 

Knowledge,  intellectual  activity,  the  mastery  of 
nature,  the  discipline  of  life— all  that  makes  up  the  edu 
cation  of  a  people— are  developed  and  diffused  through 
the  masses  of  our  population,  in  so  ample  and  generous  a 
distribution  as  to  make  this  the  conspicuous  trait  in  our 


national  character,  as  the  faithful  provision  and  exten 
sion  of  the  means  and  opportunities  of  this  education, 
are  the  cherished  institution  of  the  country.  Learning, 
literature,  science,  art,  are  cultivated,  in  their  widest 
range  and  highest  reach,  by  a  larger  and  larger  number 
of  our  people,  not,  to  their  praise  be  it  said,  as  a  personal 
distinction  or  a  selfish  possession,  but,  mainly,  as  a  gen 
erous  leaven,  to  quicken  and  expand  the  healthful  fer 
mentation  of  the  general  mind,  and  lift  the  level  of '  pop 
ular  instruction.  So  far  from  breeding  a  distempered 
spirit  in  the  people,  this  becomes  the  main  prop  of  au 
thority,  the  great  instinct  of  obedience.  "It  is  by  edu 
cation,"  says  Aristotle,  "  I  have  learned  to  do  by  choice 
what  other  men  do  by  constraint  of  fear." 


SPIRIT  OF   OUR   PEOPLE. 

The  "  breed  and  disposition"  of  a  people,  in  regard  of 
courage,  public  spirit,  and  patriotism,  are,  however,  the 
test  of  the  working  of  their  institutions,  which  the  world 
most  values,  and  upon  which  the  public  safety  most  de 
pends.  It  has  been  made  a  reproach  of  democratic  ar 
rangements  of  society  and  government  that  the  senti 
ment  of  honor,  and  of  pride  in  public  duty,  decayed  ill 
them.  It  has  been  professed  that  the  fluctuating  cur 
rents  and  the  trivial  perturbations  of  their  public  life 
discouraged  strenuous  endeavor  and  lasting  devotion  in 
the  public  ser  nee.  It  has  been  charged  that,  as  a  conse 
quence,  the  distinct  service  of  the  State  suffered,  office 
and  magistracy  were  belittled,  social  sympathies  cooled, 
love  of  country  drooped,  and  selfish  affections  absorbed 
the  powers  of  the  citizens,  and  eat  into  the  heart  of  the 
commonwealth. 

The  experience  of  our  country  rejects  these  specula 
tions  as  misplaced  and  these  fears  as  illusory.  They  be 
long  to  a  condition  of  society  above  which  we  have  long 
since  been  lifted,  and  toward  which  the  very  scheme  of 
our  national  life  prohibits  a  decline.  They  are  drawn 
from  the  examples  of  history,  which  lodged  power  for 
mally  In  the  people,  but  left  them  ignorant  and  abject, 
unfurnished  with  the  means  of  exercising  it  in  their  own 
right  and  for  their  own  benefit.  In  a  democracy  wielded 
by  the  arts,  and  to  the  ends  of  a  patrician  class,  the  less 
worthy  members  of  that  class,  no  doubt,  throve  by  the 
disdain  which  noble  characters  must  always  feel  for 
methods  of  deception  and  insincerity,  and  crowded  them 
from  the  authentic  service  of  the  State.  But,  through 
the  period  whose  years  we  count  to-day,  the  greatest 
lesson  of  all  is  the  preponderance  of  public  over  private, 
of  social  over  selfish,  tendencies  and  purposes  in  the 
whole  body  of  the  people,  and  the  persistent  fidelity  to  the 
genius  and  spirit  of  popular  institutions,  of  the  educated 
classes,  the  liberal  professions,  and  the  great  men  of  the 
country.  These  qualities  transfuse  and  blend  the  hues 
and  virtues  of  the  manifold  rays  of  advanced  civilization 
into  a  sunlight  of  public  spirit  and  fervid  patriotism, 


10 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1870. 


•which  warms  and  irradiates  the  life  of  the  nation.  Ex 
cess  of  publicity  as  the  animating  spirit  and  stimulus  of 
society  more  probably  than  its  lack  will  excite  our  solici 
tudes  in  the  future.  Even  the  public  discontents  take  on 
this  color,  and  the  mind  and  heart  of  the  whole  people 
ache  with  anxieties  and  throb  with  griefs  which  have  no 
meaner  scope  than  the  honor  and  the  safety  of  the  nation. 

Our  estimate  of  the  condition  of  this  people  at  the 
close  of  a  century— as  bearing  on  the  value  and  effi 
ciency  of  the  principles  on  which  the  Government  was 
founded,  in  maintaining  and  securing  the  permanent 
well-being  of  a  nation — would,  indeed,  be  incomplete  if 
we  failed  to  measure  the  power  and  purity  of  the  relig 
ious  elements  which  pervade  and  elevate  our  society. 
One  might  as  well  expect  our  land  to  keep  its  climate,  its 
fertility,  its  salubrity,  and  its  beauty  were  the  globe 
loosened  from  the  law  which  holds  it  in  an  orbit,  where 
we  feel  the  tempered  radiance  of  the  sun,  as  to  count 
upon  the  preservation  of  the  delights  and  glories  of 
liberty  for  a  people  cast  loose  from  religion,  whereby 
man  is  bound  Is  harmony  with  the  moral  government  of 
the  world. 

It  is  quite  certain  that  the  present  day  shows  no  such 
solemn  absorption  in  the  exalted  themes  of  contem 
plative  piety,  as  marked  the  prevalent  thought  of  the 
people  a  hundred  years  ago ;  nor  so  hopeful  an  enthu 
siasm  for  the  speedy  renovation  of  the  world,  as  burst 
upon  us  in  the  marvelous  and  wid*1  system  of  vehement, 
religious  zeal,  and  practical  good  works,  in  the  early  part 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  But  these  fires  are  less 
splendid,  only  because  they  are  more  potent,  and  diffuse 
their  heat  in  well-formed  habits  and  manifold  agencies 
of  beneficent  activity.  They  traverse  and  permeate  so 
ciety  in  every  direction.  They  travel  with  the  outposts 
of  civilization  and  outrun  the  caucus,  the  convention, 
and  the  suffrage. 

The  Church,  throughout  this  land,  upheld  by  no  politi 
cal  establishment,  rests  all  the  firmer  on  the  rock  on 
which  its  founder  built  it.  The  great  mass  of  our 
countrymen  to-day  find  in  the  Bible— the  Bible  in  their 
worship,  the  Bible  in  their  schools,  the  Bible  in  their 
households— the  sufficient  lessons  of  the  fear  of  God  and 
the  love  of  man,  which  make  -them  obedient  servants  to 
the  free  constitution  of  their  country,  in  all  civil  duties, 
and  ready  with  their  lives  to  sustain  it  on  the  fields  of 
war.  And  now  at  the  end  of  a  hundred  years  the  Chris 
tian  faith  collects  its  worshipers  throughout  our  land,  as 
at  the  beginning.  What  half  a  century  ago  was  hopefully 
prophesied  for  our  far  future,  goes  on  to  its  fulfillment : 
"As  the  sun  rises  on  a  Sabbath  morning  and  travels 
westward  from  Newfoundland  to  the  Oregon,  he  will  be 
hold  the  countless  millions  assembling,  as  if  by  a  common 
impulse,  in  the  temples  with  which  every  valley,  moun 
tain,  and  plain  will  be  adorned.  The  morning  psalm  and 
the  evening  anthem  will  commence  with  the  multitudes 
on  the  Atlantic  Coast,  be  sustained  by  the  loud  chorus  of 


ten  thousand  times  ten  thousand  in  the  Valley  of  the 
Mississippi,  and  be  prolonged  by  the  thousands  of  thou 
sands  on  the  shores  of  the  Pacific." 

XII. 
STRENGTH   OP   OUR   SYSTEM. 

What  remains  but  to  search  the  spirit  of  the  laws  of  the 
land  as  framed  by  and  modeled  to  the  popular  govern 
ment  to  which  our  fortunes  were  committed  by  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  ?  I  do  not  mean  to  exam 
ine  the  particular  legislation,  State  or  General,  by  which 
the  affairs  of  the  people  have  been  managed,  sometimes 
wisely  and  well,  at  others  feebly  and  ill,  nor  even  the 
fundamental  arrangement  of  political  authority,  or  the 
critical  treatment  of  great  junctures  in  our  policy  and 
history.  The  hour  and  the  occasion  concur  to  preclude 
so  intimate  an  inquiry.  The  chief  concern  in  this  regard, 
to  us  and  to  the  rest  of  the  world,  is,  whether  the  proud 
trust,  the  profound  radicalism,  the  wide  benevolence 
which  spoke  in  the  "  Declaration  "  and  were  infused  into 
the  "  Constitution"  at  the  first  have  been  in  good  faith  ad 
hered  to  by  the  people,  and  whether  now  these  principles 
supply  the  living  forces  which  sustain  and  direct  Govern 
ment  and  society. 

He  who  doubts  needs  but  to  look  around  to  find  all 
things  full  of  the  original  spirit  and  testifying  to  its  wis 
dom  and  strength.  We  have  taken  no  steps  backward, 
nor  have  we  needed  to  seek  other  paths  in  our  progress 
than  those  in  which  our  feet  were  planted  at  the  be 
ginning.  Weighty  and  manifold  have  been  our  obliga 
tions  to  the  great  nations  of  the  earth,  to  their  scholars, 
their  philosophers,  tlieir  men  of  genius  and  of  science,  to 
their  skill,  their  taste,  their  invention,  to  their  wealth, 
their  arts,  their  industry.  But  in  the  institutions  and 
methods  of  government— in  civil  prudence,  courage,  or 
policy— in  statesmanship,  in  the  art  of  "  making  of  a 
small  town  a  great  city  "—in  the  adjustment  of  authority 
to  liberty — in  the  concurrence  of  reason  and  strength  in 
peace,  of  force  and  obedience  in  war— we  have  found 
nothing  to  recall  us  from  the  course  of  our  fathers,  noth 
ing  to  add  to  our  safety  or  to  aid  our  progress  in  it.  So 
far  from  this,  all  modifications  of  European  politics  ac 
cept  the  popular  principles  of  our  system,  and  tend  to 
our  model.  The  movements  toward  equality  of  repre 
sentation,  enlargement  of  the  suffrage,  and  public  educa 
tion  in  England— the  restoration  of  unity  in  Italy— the 
confederation  of  Germany  under  the  lead  of  Prussia— the 
actual  Republic  in  France— the  unsteady  throne  of  Spain 
—the  new  liberties  of  Hungary— the  constant  gain  to  the 
peop'e's  share  in  government  throughout  Europe— all 
tend  one  way,  the  way  pointed  out  in  the  Declaration  of 
our  Independence. 

The  care  and  zeal  with  which  our  people  cherish  and 
invigorate  the  primary  supports  and  defenses  of  their 
own  sovereignty  have  all  the  unswerving  force  and  con 
fidence  of  instincts.  The  community  and  publicity  of 


What  the  Age  Owes  to  America— -Evarts. 


11 


education,  at  the  charge  and  as  an  institution  of  the 
State,  is  firmly  imbedded  in  the  wants  and  the  desires  of 
the  people.  Common  schools  are  rapidly  extending 
through  the  only  part  of  the  country  which  had  been 
•hut  against  them,  and  follow  close  upon  the  footsteps 
of  its  new  liberty  to  eulighten  the  enfranchised  race. 
Freedom  of  conscience  easily  stamps  out  the  first 
sparkles  of  persecution,  and  snaps  as  green  withes  the 
first  bonds  of  spiritual  domination.  The  sacred  oracles 
of  their  religion  the  people  wisely  hold  in  their  own 
keeping  as  the  keys  of  religious  liberty,  and  refuse  to  be 
beguiled  by  the  voice  of  the  wisest  charmer  into  loosing 
their  grasp. 

Freedom  from  military  power  and  the  maintenance  of 
that  arm  of  the  Government  in  the  people ;  a  trust  in 
their  own  adequacy  as  soldiers,  when  their  duty  as  citi- 
sens  should  need  to  take  on  that  form  of  service  to  the 
State;  these  have  gained  new  force  by  the  experience  of 
foreign  and  civil  war,  and  a  standing  army  is  a  remoter 
possibility  for  this  nation,  in  its  present  or  prospective 
greatness,  than  in  the  days  of  its  small  beginnings. 

But  in  the  freedom  of  the  press,  and  the  universality  of 
the  suffrage,  as  maintained  and  exercised  to-day  through 
out  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  land,  we  find  the  most 
conspicuous  and  decisive  evidence  of  the  unspent  force 
of  the  institutions  of  liberty  and  the  jealous  guard  of  its 
principal  defenses.  These  indeed  are  the  great  agencies 
and  engines  of  the  people's  sovereignty.  They  hold  the 
same  relations  to  the  vast  democracy  of  modern  society 
that  the  persuasions  of  the  orators  and  the  personal 
voices  of  the  assembly  did  in  the  narrow  confines  of  the 
Grecian  States.  The  laws,  the  customs,  the  impulses, 
and  sentiments  of  the  people  have  given  wider  and  wider 
range  and  license  to  the  agitations  of  the  press,  multi 
plied  and  more  frequent  occasions  for  the  exercise  of  the 
suffrage,  larger  and  larger  communication  of  its  fran 
chise.  The  progress  of  a  hundred  years  finds  these  pro 
digious  activities  in  the  fullest  play— incessant  and  all- 
powerful— indispensable  in  the  habits  of  the  people, 
and  impregnable  in  their  affections.  Their  public 
service,  and  their  subordination  to  the  public  safety, 
stand,  in  their  play  upon  one  another  and  in 
their  freedom  thus  maintained.  Neither  could  long 
exist  in  true  vigor  in  our  system  without  the 
other.  Without  the  watchful,  omnipresent  and  indom 
itable  energy  of  the  press,  the  suffrage  would  languish, 
would  be  subjugated  by  the  corporate  power  of  the 
legions  of  placemen  which  the  administration  of  the 
affairs  of  a  great  nation  imposes  upon  it,  and  fall  a  prey 
to  that  "vast  patronage  which,"  we  are  told  "dis 
tracted,  corrupted,  and  finally  subverted  the  Roman 
Eepublic."  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  impressions  of  the 
press  upon  the  opinions  and  passions  of  the  people  found 
no  settled  and  ready  mode  of  their  working  out,  through 
the  frequent  and  peaceful  suffrage,  the  people  would  be 
driven,  to  satisfy  their  displeasure  at  government  or 


vheir  love  of  change,  to  the  coarse  methods  of  barricade* 
and  batteries. 

XIII. 

OUR    COUNTRY    TO-DAY. 

We  cannot  then  hesitate  to  declare  that  the  original 
principles  of  equal  society  and  popular  government  still 
inspire  the  laws,  live  in  the  habits  of  the  people,  and  ani 
mate  their  purposes  and  their  hopes.  These  principles 
have  not  lost  their  spring  or  elasticity.  They  have  suf 
ficed  for  all  the  methods  of  government  in  the  past ;  we 
feel  no  fear  for  their  adequacy  in  the,  future.  Released 
now  from  the  tasks  and  burdens  of  the  formative  period, 
these  principles  and  methods  can  be  directed  with  undi 
vided  force  to  the  every-day  conduct  of  government^  to 
the  staple  and  steady  virtues  of  administration.  The 
feebleness  of  crowding  the  statute-books  with  unexecuted 
laws ;  the  danger  of  power  outgrowing  or  evading  re 
sponsibility  ;  the  rashness  and  fickleness  of  temporary 
expedients;  the  constant  tendency  by  which  parties  de 
cline  into  factions  and  end  in  conspiracies ;  all  these  mis 
chiefs  beset  all  governments  and  are  part  of  the  life  of 
each  generation.  To  deal  with  these  evils— the  tasks  and 
burdens  of  the  immediate  future — the  nation  needs  no 
other  resources  than  the  principles  and  the  examples  of 
our  past  history  supply.  These  principles,  these  exam 
ples  of  our  fathers,  are  the  strength  and  the  safety  of  our 
State  to-day:  " Moribus  antiquis,  stat  res  Romana,  vir- 
isque." 

Unity,  liberty,  power,  prosperity— these  are  our  pos 
sessions  to-day.  Our  territory  is  safe  against  foreign 
dangers;  its  completeness  dissuades  from  further  am 
bitions  to  extend  it,  and  its  rounded  symmetry  dis 
courages  all  attempts  to  dismember  it.  No  division  into 
greatly  unequal  parts  would  be  tolerable  to  either.  No 
imaginable  union  of  interests  or  passions,  large  enough 
to  include  one-half  the  country,  but  must  embrace  much 
more.  The  madness  of  partition  into  numerous  and 
feeble  fragments  could  proceed  only  from  the  hopeless 
degradation  of  the  people,  and  would  form  but  an  inci 
dent  in  general  ruin. 

The  spirit  of  the  nation  is  at  the  highest— its  triumph- 
over  the  inborn,  inbred  perils  of  the  Constitution  has 
chased  away  all  fears,  justified  all  hopes,  and  with  uni 
versal  joy  we  greet  this  day.  We  have  not  proved  un 
worthy  of  a  great  ancestry  ;  we  have  had  the  virtue  to 
uphold  what  they  so  wisely,  so  firmly  established.  With 
these  proud  possessions  of  the  past,  with  powers  ma 
tured,  with  principles  settled,  with  habiis  formed,  the 
nation  passes  as  it  were  from  preparatory  growth  to  re 
sponsible  development  of  character,  and  the  steady  per 
formance  of  duty.  What  labors  await  it,  what  trials 
shall  attend  it,  what  triumphs  for  human  nature,  what 
glory  for  itself,  are  prepared  for  this  people  iu  the 
coming  century,  we  may  not  assume  to  foretell.  "  One 
generation  passeth  away,  and  another  generation  cometh, 
but  the  earth  abideth  forever,"  and  we  reverently  hopc 


12 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


that  these  our  constituted  liberties  shall  be  maintained  to 
the  unending  line  of  our  posterity,  and  so  long  as  the 
earth  itself  shall  endure. 

In  the  great  procession  of  nations,  in  the  great  march 
of  humanity,  we  hold  our  place.  Peace  is  our  duty, 
peace  is  our  policy.  In  its  arts,  its  labors,  and  its  vic 
tories,  then,  we  find  scope  for  all  our  energies,  rewards 
for  all  our  ambitions,  renown  enough  for  all  our  love  and 
fame.  In  the  august  presence  of  so  many  nations,  which, 
by  their  representatives,  have  done  us  the  honor  to  be 
witnesses  of  our  commemorative  joy  and  gratulation, 
and  in  sight  of  the  collected  evidences  of  the  greatness 
of  their  own  civilization  with  which  they  grace  our  cele- 
"bration,  we  may  well  confess  how  much  we  fall  short, 
how  much  we  have  to  make  up,  in  the  emulative  compe 
titions  of  the  times.  Yet,  even  in  this  presence,  and  with 
a  just  deference  to  the  age,  the  power,  the  greatness  of 
the  other  nations  of  the  earth,  we  do  not  fear  to  appeal 
to  the  opinion  of  mankind  whether,  as  we  point  to  our 
land,  our  people,  and  our  laws,  the  contemplation  should 
not  inspire  us  with  a  lover's  enthusiasm  for  our  country. 

Time  makes  no  pauses  in  his  march.  Even  while  I 
«peak  the  last  hour  of  the  receding  is  replaced  by  the 


first  hour  of  the  coming  century,  and  reverence  for  the 
past  gives  way  to  the  joys  and  hopes,  the  activities  and 
the  responsibilities  of  the  future.  A  hundred  years  hence 
the  piety  of  that  generation  will  recall  the  ancestral 
glory  which  we  celebrate  to-day,  and  crown  it  with  the 
plaudits  of  a  vast  population  which  no  man  can  number. 
By  the  mere  circumstance  of  this  periodicity  our  genera 
tion  will  be  in  the  minds,  in  the  hearts,  on  the  lips  of  our 
countrymen  at  the  next  Centennial  commemoration  in 
comparison  with  their  own  character  and  condition  and 
with  the  great  founders  of  the  nation.  What  shall  they 
say  of  us1?  How  shall  they  estimate  the  part  we  bear  iu 
the  unbroken  line  of  the  nation's  progress  ?  And  so  on, 
in  the  long  reach  of  time,  forever  and  forever,  our  place 
in  the  secular  roll  of  the  ages  must  always  bring  us  into 
observation  and  criticism.  Under  this  double  trust, 
then,  from  the  past  and  for  the  future,  let  us  take  heed 
to  our  ways,  and  while  it  is  called  to-day,  resolve  that 
the  great  heritage  we  have  received  shall  be  handed 
down  through  the  long  line  of  the  advancing  generations, 
the  home  of  liberty,  the  abode  of  justice,  the  stronghold 
of  faith  among  men,  "  which  holds  the  moral  elements 
of  the  world  together,"  and  of  faith  in  God,  which  binds 
that  world  to  His  throne. 


EISE     OF    CONSTITUTIONAL     LIBERTY. 


THE    REV.    DR.    STORES    AT    THE    ACADEMY    OF    MUSIC,    NEW-YORK. 


1. 

MR.  PRESIDENT  —  FELLOW-CITIZENS  :  The 
long-expected  day  has  come,  and  passing  peacefully  the 
Impalpable  line  which  separates  ages,  the  Republic  com 
pletes  its  hundredth  year.  The  predictions  in  which  af 
fectionate  hope  gave  inspiration  to  political  prudence 
are  fulfilled.  The  fears  of  the  timid,  and  the  hopes  of 
those  to  whom  our  national  existence  is  a  menace,  are 
alike  disappointed.  The  fable  of  the  physical  world  be 
comes  the  fact  of  the  political ;  and  after  alternate  sun- 
ehine  and  storm,  after  heavings  of  the  earth  which  only 
deepened  its  roots,  and  ineffectual  blasts  of  lightning 
whose  lurid  threat  died  in  the  air,  under  a  sky  now  rain 
ing  on  it  benignant  influence,  the  century-plant  of  Amer 
ican  Independence  and  popular  government  bursts  into 
this  magnificent  blossom  of  a  joyful  celebration  illumi 
nating  the  land! 

With  what  desiring  though  doubtful  expectation  those 
whose  action  we  commemorate  looked  for  the  possible 
coming  of  this  day,  we  know  from  the  records  which 
they  have  left.  With  what  anxious  solicitude  the  states 
men  and  the  soldiers  of  the  following  generation  antici 
pated  the  changes  which  might  take  place  before  this 


Centennial  year  should  be  reached,  we  have  heard  our 
selves,  in  their  great  and  fervent  admonitory  words. 
How  dim  and  drear  the  prospect  seemed  to  our  own 
hearts  fifteen  years  since,  when,  on  the  Fourth  of  July, 
1861,  the  XXXVIIth  Congress  met  at  Washington  with 
no  representative  in  either  House  from  any  State  south 
of  Tennessee  and  Western  Virginia,  and  when  a  deter 
mined  and  numerous  army,  under  skillful  commanders, 
approached  and  menaced  the  capital  and  the  Govern 
ment—this  we  surely  have  not  forgotten ;  nor  how,  in 
the  terrible  years  which  followed,  the  blood  and  fire,  and 
vapor  of  smoke,  seemed  oftentimes  to  swim  as  a  sea,  or 
to  rise  as  a  wall,  between  our  eyes  and  this  anniversary. 
"  It  cannot  outlast  the  second  generation  from  those 
who  founded  it,"  was  the  exulting  conviction  of  the 
many  who  loved  the  traditions  and  state  of  monarchy, 
and  who  felt  them  insecure  before  the  widening  fame  in 
the  world  of  our  prosperous  Republic.  "  It  may  not 
reach  its  hundredth  year,"  was  the  deep  and  sometimes 
the  sharp  apprehension  of  those  who  felt,  as  all  of  us  felt, 
that  their  own  liberty,  welfare,  hope,  with  the  brigfitest 
political  promise  of  the  world,  were  bound  up  with  the 
unity  ana  the  life  of  our  nation.  Never  was  solicitud^ 


Rise  of  Constitutional  Liberty — Storrs. 


13 


more  intense,  never  was  prayer  to  Almighty  God  more 
fervent  and  constant— not  in  the  earliest  beginnings  of 
our  history,  when  Indian  ferocity  threatened  that  history 
with  a  swift  termination;  not  in  the  days  of  supremest 
trial  amid  the  Revolution— than  in  those  years  when  the 
nation  seemed  suddenly  split  asunder,  and  forces  which 
had  been  combined  for  its  creation  were  clinched  and 
rocking  back  and  forth  in  bloody  grapple  on  the  question 
of  its  maintenance. 

The  prayer  was  heard.  The  effort  and  the  sacrifice 
have  come  to  their  fruitage,  and  to-day  the  nation— still 
one,  as  at  the  start,  though  now  expanded  over  such  im 
mense  spaces,  absorbing  such  incessant  and  diverse  ele 
ments  from  other  lands,  developing  within  it  opinions  so 
conflicting,  interests  so  various,  and  forms  of  occupation 
so  novel  and  manifold— to-day  the  nation,  emerging  from 
the  toil  and  the  turbulent  strife,  with  the  earlier  and  the 
later  clouds  alike  swept  out  of  its  resplendent  stellar 
arch,  pauses  from  its  work  to  remember  and  rejoice ; 
with  exhilarated  spirit  to  anticipate  its  future,  with  rev 
erent  heart  to  offer  to  God  its  great  Te  Deum. 

II. 
A  DAY  OF  COSMOPOLITAN  JOY, 

Not  here  alone,  in  thi(s  great  city,  whose  lines  have  gone 
out  into  all  the  earth,  and  whose  superb  progress  in 
wealth,  in  culture,  and  in  civic  renown  is  itself  the  most 
illustrious  token  of  the  power  and  beneficence  of  that 
frame  of  government  under  which  it  has  been  realized ; 
not  alone  in  yonder— I  had  almost  said  adjoining— city, 
whence  issued  the  paper  that  first  announced  our  na 
tional  existence,  and  where  now  rises  the  magnificent 
Exposition,  testifying  for  all  progressive  States  to  their 
respect  and  kindness  toward  us,  the  radiant  clasp  of  dia 
mond  and  opal  on  the  girdle  of  the  sympathies  which  in 
terweave  their  peoples  with  ours  ;  not  alone  in  Boston, 
the  historic  town,  first  in  resistance  to  British  aggression 
and  foremost  in  plans  for  the  new  and  popular  organiza 
tion,  one  of  whose  citizens  wrote  his  name,  as  if  cutting 
it  with  a  plowshare,  at  the  head  of  all  on  our  great 
charter,  another  of  whose  citizens  was  its  intrepid  and 
powerful  champion,  aiding  its  passage  through  the  Con 
gress  ;  not  there  alone,  nor  yet  in  other  great  cities  of  the 
land,  but  in  smaller  towns,  in  villages  and  hamlets,  this 
day  will  be  kept,  a  secular  Sabbath,  sacred  alike  to  mem 
ory  and  to  hope. 

Not  only,  indeed,  where  men  are  assembled,  as  we  are 
here,  will  it  be  honored.  The  lonely  and  remote  will 
have  their  parts  in  this  commemoration.  Where  the 
boatman  follows  the  winding  stream  or  the  woodman  ex 
plores  the  forest  shades ;  where  the  miner  lays  down  his 
eager  drill  beside  rocks  which  guard  the  precious  veins, 
or  where  the  herdsman,  along  the  sierras,  looks  forth  on 
the  seas  which  now  reflect  the  rising  day,  which  at  our 
midnight  shall  be  gleaming  like  gold  in  the  setting  sun  ; 
there  also  will  the  day  be  regarded  as  a  day  of  memorial. 


The  sailor  on  the  sea  will  note  it,  and  dress  his  ship  in  its 
brightest  array  of  flags  and  bunting.  Americans  dwell 
ing  in  foreign  lands  will  note  and  keep  it. 

London  itself  will  to-day  be  more  festive  because  of  the 
event  which  a  century  ago  shadowed  its  streets,  incensed 
its  Parliament,  and  tore  from  the  crown  of  its  obstinate 
King  the  chiefest  jewel.  On  the  boulevards  of  Paris,  iu 
the  streets  of  Berlin,  and  along  the  leveled  bastions  of 
Vienna,  at  Marseilles,  and  at  Florence,  upon  the  silent 
liquid  ways  of  stately  Venice,  in  the  passes  of  the  Alps, 
under  the  shadow  of  church  and  obelisk,  palace  and 
ruin,  which  still  prolong  the  majesty  of  Rome ;  yet,  fur 
ther  east,  on  the  Bosphorus  and  in  Syria ;  in  Egypt 
which  writes  on  the  front  of  its  compartment  in  the  great 
Exhibition :  "  The  oldest  people  of  the  world  sends  its 
morning  greeting  to  the  youngest  nation;"  along  the 
hights  behind  Bombay,  in  the  foreign  hongs  of  Canton 
in  the  "  Islands  of  the  Morning,"  which  found  the  dawn 
of  their  new  age  in  the  startling  sight  of  an  American 
squadron  entering  their  bays— everywhere  will  be  those 
who  have  thought  of  this  day,  and  who  join  with  us  to 
greet  its  comitig. 

No  other  such  anniversary,  probably,  has  attracted 
hitherto  such  general  notice.  You  have  seen  Rome,  per 
haps,  on  one  of  those  shining  April  days  when  the  tradi 
tional  anniversary  of  the  founding  of  the  city  fills  its 
streets  with  civic  processions,  with  military  display,  and 
the  most  elaborate  fireworks  in  Europe  ;  you  may  have 
seen  Holland  in  1872,  when  the  whole  country  bloomed 
with  orange  on  the  three-hundredth  aaniversary  of  the 
capture  by  the  sea-beggars  of  the  City  of  Briel,  and  of 
the  revolt  against  Spanish  domination  which  thereupon 
flashed  on  different  sides  into  sudden  explosion.  But 
these  celebrations,  and  others  like  them,  have  been 
chiefly  local.  The  world  outside  has  taken  no  wide  im 
pression  from  them.  This  of  ours  is  the  first  of  which 
many  lands,  in  different  tongues,  will  have  had  report. 
Partly  because  the  world  is  narrowed  in  our  time,  and 
its  distant  peoples  are  made  neighbors  by  the  fleeter  ma 
chineries  now  in  use ;  partly  because  we  have  drawn  sa 
many  to  our  population  from  foreign  lands,  while  the 
restless  and  acquisitive  spirit  of  our  people  has  made 
them  at  home  on  every  shore ;  but  partly,  also,  and  es 
sentially,  because  of  the  nature  and  the  relations  of  that 
event  which  we  commemorate,  and  of  the  influence  ex 
erted  by  it  on  subsequent  history,  the  attention  of  men 
is  more  or  less  challenged,  in  every  center  of  commerce 
and  of  thought,  by  this  anniversary. 

Indeed  it  is  not  unnatural  to  feel— certainly  it  is  not 
irreverent  to  feel— that  they  who  by  wisdom,  by  valor, 
and  by  sacrifice,  have  contributed  to  perfect  and  main 
tain  the  institutions  which  we  possess,  and  have  added 
by  death  as  well  as  by  life  to  the  luster  of  our  history, 
must  also  have  an  interest  in  this  day  ;  that  in  their 
timeless  habitations  they  remember  us  beneath  the  lower 
circle  of  the  heavens,  are  glad  in  our  joy,  and  share  and 


14 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


Jead  onr  grateful  praise.  To  a  spirit  alive  with  the  memo 
ries  of  the  time,  and  rejoicing  in  its  presage  of  nobler 
futures,  recalling  the  great,  the  beloved,  the  heroic,  who 
have  labored  and  joyfully  died  for  its  coming,  it  will  not 
seem  too  fond  an  enthusiasm  to  feel  thattbe  air  is  quick 
with  shapes  we  cannot  see,  and  glows  with  faces  whose 
light  serene  we  may  not  catch !  They  who  counseled  in 
the  Cabinet,  they  who  denned  and  settled  the  law  in  de 
cisions  of  the  bench,  they  who  pleaded  with  mighty  elo 
quence  in  the  Senate,  they  who  poured  out  their  souls  in 
triumphau t  effusion  for  the  liberty  which  they  loved  in 
forum  or  pulpit,  they  who  gave  their  young  and  glorious 
life  as  an  offering  on  the  field,  that  government  for  the 
people  and  by  the  people  might  not  perish  from  the  earth- 
it  cannot  be  but  that  they  too  have  part  and  place  in  this 
jubilee  of  our  history  !  God  make  our  doings  not  un 
worthy  of  such  spectators,  and  make  our  spirit  sympa 
thetic  with  theirs,  from  whom  all  selfish  passion  and 
pride  have  now  forever  passed  away  ! 

The  interest  which  is  felt  so  distinctly  and  widely  in 
this  anniversary  reflects  a  light  on  the  greatness  of  the 
action  which  it  commemorates.  It  shows  that  we  do  not 
unduly  exaggerate  the  significance  or  the  importance  of 
that ;  that  it  had  really  large,  even  world-wide,  relations, 
and  contributed  an  effective  and  a  valuable  force  to  the 
furtherance  of  the  cause  of  freedom,  education,  humane 
institutions,  and  popular  advancement,  wherever  its  in 
fluence  has  been  felt.  Yet  when  we  consider  the  action 
itself  it  may  easily  seem  but  slight  in  its  nature,  as  it 
was  certainly  commonplace  in  its  circumstances.  There 
was  nothing  even  picturesque  in  its  surroundings,  to  en 
list  for  it  the  pencil  of  the  painter,  or  help  to  fix  any 
luminous  image  of  that  which  was  done  on  the  popular 
memory. 

In  this  respect  it  is  singularly  contrasted  with  other 
great  and  kindred  events  in  general  history ;  with  those 
heroic  and  fruitful  actions  in  English  history  which  had 
especially  prepared  the  way  for  it,  and  with  which  the 
thoughtful  student  of  the  past  will  always  set  it  in  inti 
mate  relations. 

III. 

KING  JOHN  AND  MAGNA  CHARTA. 
When,  five  centuries  and  a  half  before,  on  the  15th  of 
June,  and  the  following  days,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord 
1215,  the  English  barons  met  King  John  in  the  long 
meadow  of  Runnymede,  and  forced  from  him  the  Magua 
Charta— the  strong  foundation  and  steadfast  bulwark  of 
English  liberty,  concerning  which  Mr.  Hallam  has  said 
in  our  own  time  that  "  all  which  has  been  since  obtained 
is  little  more  than  as  confirmation- or  commentary"— no 
circumstance  was  wanting  of  outward  pageantry  to 
give  dignity,  brilliance,  impressiveness  to  the  scene.  On 
the  one  side  was  the  King,  with  the  Mshops  and 
gentry  who  adhered  to  him,  and  the  Papal  legate  before 
whom  he  had  lately  rendered  his  homage.  On  the  other 
side  was  the  great  and  determined  majority  of  the  barons 


of  England,  with  multitudes  of  knights,  armed  vassals, 
and  retainers.  Stephen  Langton,  Archbishop  of  Canter 
bury,  the  head  of  the  English  clergy,  was  with  them ; 
the  Bishops  of  London,  Winchester,  Lincoln,  Worces 
ter,  Rochester,  and  of  other  great  Sees.  The  Earl 
of  Pembroke,  daring  and  wise,  of  vast  and  increasing 
power  in  the  realm,  was  at  their  head.  Robert  Fitz 
Walter,  whose  lair  daughter  Matilda  the  profligate  King 
had  forcibly  abducted,  was  Marshal  of  the  Army— the 
"Army  of  God  and  the  Holy  Church."  William  Long- 
sword,  Earl  of  Salisbury,  half-brother  of  the  King,  was 
with  the  barons.  The  Earls  of  Albemarle,  Arundel, 
Gloucester,  Hereford,  Norfolk,  Oxford,  were  in  the  array ; 
the  great  Earl  Warrenne,  who  claimed  the  same  right  of 
the  sword  in  his  barony  which  William  the  Conqueror 
had  had  in  the  Kingdom  ;  the  Constable  of  Scotland, 
Hubert  de  Burgh,  Seneschel  of  Poictou,  and  many  othei 
powerful  nobles.  Some  burgesses  of  London  were 
present  as  well ;  and  doubtless  there  mingled  with  the 
throng  those  skillful  clerks  whose  pens  had  drawn  the 
great  instrument  of  freedom,  and  whose  training  in 
language  had  given  a  remarkable  precision  to  its  exact 
clauses  and  cogent  terms. 

Pennons  and  banners  streamed  at  large,  and  spear 
heads  gleamed  above  the  host.  The  Juno  sunshine 
flashed,  reflected  from  inlaid  shields  and  damascened 
armor.  The  terrible  bows  of  the  English  yeomen  hung 
on  their  shoulders.  The  voice  of  trumpets  and  clamoring 
bugles  was  in  the  air.  The  whole  scene  was  va&t  as  a 
battle,  though  bright  as  a  tournament;  splendid,  but 
threatening,  like  burnished  clouds,  in  which  lightnfngs 
sleep.  The  King,  one  of  the  handsomest  men  of  the 
time,  though  cruelty,  perfidy,  and  every  foul  passion 
must  have  left  their  traces  on  his  face,  was  especially 
fond  of  magnificence  in  dress,  wearing,  we  are  told,  on 
one  Christmas  occasion  a  rich  mantle  of  red  satin,  em 
broidered  with  sapphires  and  pearls,  a  tunic  of  white 
damask,  a  girdle  lustrous  with  precious  stones,  and  a 
baldric  from  his  shoulder,  crossing  his  breast,  set  with 
diamonds  and  emeralds,  while  even  his  gloves— as  indeed 
is  stiH  indicated  on  his  fine  effigy  in  Worcester  Cathedral 
—bore  similar  ornaments,  the  one  a  ruby,  the  other  a 
sapphire. 

Whatever  was  superb,  therefore,  in  that  consummate 
age  of  royal  and  baronial  state,  whatever  was  splendid 
in  the  glittering  and  grand  apparatus  of  chivalry,  what 
ever  was  impressive  in  the  almost  more  than  princely 
pomp  of  the  prelates  of  the  Church— 

The  boast  of  heraldry,  the  pomp  of  power 
And  all  that  beauty,  all  that  wealth  e'er  gave 

—all  this  was  marshaled  on  that  historic  plain  in  Surrey 
where  John  and  the  barons  faced  each  other,  where 
Saxon  King  and  Saxon  Earl  had  met  in  council  before  the 
Norman  had  footing  in  England ;  and  all  combined  lo 
give  a  fit  magnificence  of  setting  to  the  great  charter 
there  granted  and  sealed. 


llise  of  Constitutional  Liberty— Starrs. 


15 


The  tower  of  Windsor— not  of  the  present  castle  and 
palace,  but  of  the  earlier  detached  fortress  which  already 
crowned  the  cliff,  and  from  which  John  had  come  to  the 
field— looked  down  on  the  scene.  On  the  one  side  low 
hills  inclosed  the  meadow  ;  on  the  other  the  Thames 
flowed  brightly  by,  seekiner  the  capital  and  the  sea. 
Every  feature  of  the  scene  was  English,  save  one ;  but 
over  all  loomed,  in  a  portentous  and  haughty  stillness, 
in  the  ominous  presence  of  the  envoy  from  Rome,  that 
ubiquitous  power,  surpassing  all  others,  which  already 
had  once  laid  the  kingdom  under  interdict,  and  had 
exiled  John  from  Church  and  throne,  but  to  which,  later, 
he  had  been  reconciled,  and  on  which  now  he  secretly 
relied  to  annul  the  charter  which  he  was  granting. 

The  brilliant  panorama  illuminates  the  page  which 
bears  its  story.  It  rises  still  as  a  vision  before  one,  as  he 
looks  on  the  venerable  parchment  originals,  preserved  to 
our  day  in  the  British  Museum.  Tf  it  be  true,  as  Hallam 
has  said,  that  from  that  era  there  was  a  new  soul  in  the 
people  of  England,  it  must  be  confessed  that  the  place, 
the  day,  and  aU  the  circumstances  of  that  new  birth 
were  fitting:  to  the  great  and  the  vital  event. 

IV. 

THE   ENGLISH  PETITION  OF  EIGHT. 

That  age  passed  away,  and  its  peculiar  splendor  of 
aspect  was  not  thereafter  to  be  repeated.  Yet  when,  400 
years  later,  on  the  7th  of  June,  1628,  the  Petition  of 
Eight,  the  second  great  charter  of  the  liberties  of  En 
gland,  was  presented  by  Parliament  to  Charles  I.,  the 
scene  and  its  accessories  were  hardly  less  impressive. 

Into  that  law— called  a  petition,  as  if  to  mask  the 
deadly  energy  of  its  blow  upon  tyranny— had  been  col 
lected  by  the  skill  of  its  framers  all  the  heads  of  the 
despotic  prerogative  which  Charles  had  exercised,  that 
they  might  all  together  be  smitten  with  one  tremendous 
destroying  stroke.  The  King,  enthroned  in.  his  chair  of 
state,  looked  forth  on  those  who  waited  for  his  word,  as 
still  he  looks,  with  his  forecasting  and  melancholy  face, 
from  the  canvas  of  Van  Dyke.  Before  him  were  assem 
bled  the  nobles  of  England— in  peaceful  array,  and  not  in 
armor,  but  with  a  civil  power  in  their  hands  which  the 
older  gauntlets  could  not  have  held,  and  with  the 
memories  of  a  long  renown  almost  as  visible  to  them 
selves  and  to  the  King,  as  were  the  tapestries  suspended 
on  the  walls. 

Crowding  the  bar,  behind  these  descendants  of  the 
earlier  barons,  were  the  members  of  the  House  of  Com- 
mocs,  with  whom  the  law  now  presented  to  the  King 
had  had  its  origin,  and  whose  boldness  and  tenacity  had 
constrained  the  peers,  after  vain  endeavor  to  modify  its 
provisions,  to  accept  them  as  they  stood.  They  were  the 
most  powerful  body  of  representatives  of  the  kingdom 
that  had  yet  been  convened ;  possessing  a  private  wealth, 
it  was  estimated,  surpassing  threefold  that  of  the  Peers, 


and  representing  not  less  than  they  the  best  life  and  the 
oldest  lineage  of  the  Kingdom  which  they  loved. 

Their  dexterous,  dauntless,  and  far-sighted  sagacity  i? 
yet  more  evident,  as  we  look  back,  than  their  wealth  or 
their  breeding  ;  and  among  them  were  men  whose  names 
will  be  familiar  while  England  continues.  Wentworth 
was  there,  soon  to  be  the  most  dangerous  of  traitors  to  the 
cause  of  which  he  was  then  the  champion,  but  who 
then  appeared  as  resolute  as  ever  to  vindicate  the  an 
cient,  lawful,  and  vital  liberties  of  the  kingdom ;  and 
Pym  was  there,  who  not  long  after  was  to  warn  the  dark 
and  haughty  apostate  that  he  never  again  would  leave 
pursuit  of  him  so  long  as  his  head  stood  on  his  shoulders 
Hampden  was  there,  considerate  and  serene,  but  inflex 
ible  as  an  oak  ;  once  imprisoned  already  for  his  resistance 
to  an  unjust  taxation,  and  ready  again  to  suffer  and  to 
conquer  in  the  same  supreme  caus?.  Sir  John  Eliot  was 
there,  eloquent  and  devoted,  who  had  tasted  also  the 
bitterness  of  imprisonment,  and  who,  after  years  of  its 
subsequent  experience,  was  to  die  a  martyr  in  the  Tower. 
Coke  was  there,  77  years  of  age,  but  full  of  fire  as  full  of 
fame,  whose  vehement  and  unswerving  hand  had  had 
chief  part  in  framing  the  petition.  Selden  was  there,  the 
repute  of  whose  learning  was  already  Continental.  Sir 
Francis  Seymour,  Sir  Robert  Philips,  Strode,  Hobart, 
Denzil  Holies,  and  Valentine— such  were  the  Commoners; 
and  there,  not  impossibly  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  faced 
the  King,  a  silent  young  member  who  had  come  now  to 
his  first  Parliament,  at  the  age  of  29,  from  the  borough  of 
Huntingdon,  Oliver  Cromwell. 

In  a  plain  cloth  suit  he  stood  among  his  colleagues. 
But  they  were  often  splendid  and  even  sumptuous  in 
dress;  with  embroidered  doublets  and  coats  of  velvet, 
with  flowing  collars  of  rich  lace,  the  swords  by  their  sides 
with  flashing  hilts,  their  very  hats  jeweled  and  plumed, 
the  abundant  dressed  and  perfumed  hair  falling  in  curls 
upon  their  shoulders.  Here  and  there  were  those  who 
still  more  distinctly  symbolized  their  spirit  with  steel 
corselets,  overlaid  with  lace  and  rich  embroidery. 

So  stood  they  in  the  presence,  representing  to  the  full 
the  wealth  and  genius  and  stately  civic  pomp  of  England, 
until  the  King  had  pronounced  his  assent,  in  the  express 
customary  form,  to  the  law  which  confirmed  the  popular 
liberties ;  and  when,  on  hearing  his  unequivocal  final  as 
sent,  they  burst  into  loud,  even  passionate,  acclamations 
of  victorious  joy,  there  had  been  from  the  first  no  scene 
more  impressive  in  that  venerable  hall,  whose  history- 
went  back  to  Edward  the  Confessor. 

In  what  sharp  contrast  with  the  rich  ceremonial  and 
the  splendid  accessories  of  these  preceding  kindred 
events,  appears  that  modest  scene  at  Philadelphia,  from 
which  we  gratefully  date  to-day  a  hundred  years  of  con 
stant  and  prosperous  national  life  1 


14 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


Jead  oar  grateful  praise.  To  a  spirit  alive  with  the  memo 
ries  of  the  time,  and  rejoicing  in  its  presage  of  nobler 
futures,  recalling  the  great,  the  beloved,  the  heroic,  who 
have  labored  and  joyfully  died  for  its  coming,  it  will  not 
seem  too  fond  an  enthusiasm  to  feel  that  the  air  is  quick 
with  shapes  we  cannot  eee,  and  glows  with  faces  whose 
light  serene  we  may  not  catch !  They  who  counseled  in 
the  Cabinet,  they  who  denned  and  settled  the  law  in  de 
cisions  of  the  bench,  they  who  pleaded  with  mighty  elo 
quence  in  the  Senate,  they  who  poured  out  their  souls  in 
triumphant  effusion  for  the  liberty  which  they  loved  in 
forum  or  pulpit,  they  who  gave  their  young  and  glorious 
life  as  an  offering  on  the  field,  that  government  for  the 
people  and  by  the  people  might  not  perish  from  the  earth- 
it  cannot  be  but  that  they  too  have  part  and  place  in  this 
jubilee  of  our  history  !  God  make  our  doings  not  un 
worthy  of  such  spectators,  and  make  our  spirit  sympa 
thetic  with  theirs,  from  whom  all  selfish  passion  and 
pride  have  now  forever  passed  away  ! 

The  interest  which  is  felt  so  distinctly  and  widely  in 
this  anniversary  reflects  a  light  on  the  greatness  of  the 
action  which  it  commemorates.  It  shows  that  we  do  not 
unduly  exaggerate  the  significance  or  the  importance  of 
that ;  that  it  had  really  large,  even  world-wide,  relations, 
and  contributed  an  effective  and  a  valuable  force  to  the 
furtherance  of  the  cause  of  freedom,  education,  humane 
institutions,  and  popular  advancement,  wherever  its  in 
fluence  has  been  felt.  Yet  when  we  consider  the  action 
itself  it  may  easily  seem  but  slight  in  its  nature,  as  it 
was  certainly  commonplace  in  its  circumstances.  There 
was  nothing  even  picturesque  in  its  surroundings,  to  en 
list  for  it  the  pencil  of  the  painter,  or  help  to  fix  any 
luminous  image  of  that  which  was  done  on  the  popular 
memory. 

In  this  respect  it  is  singularly  contrasted  with  other 
great  and  kindred  events  in  general  history ;  with  those 
heroic  and  fruitful  actions  in  English  history  which  had 
especially  prepared  the  way  for  it,  and  with  which  the 
thoughtful  student  of  the  past  will  always  set  it  in  inti 
mate  relations. 

III. 

KING  JOHN  AND  MAGNA  CHARTA. 
When,  five  centuries  and  a  half  before,  on  the  loth  of 
June,  and  the  following  days,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord 
1215,  the  English  barons  met  King  John  in  the  long 
meadow  of  Runnymede,  and  forced  from  him  the  Magna 
Charta— the  strong  foundation  and  steadfast  bulwark  of 
English  liberty,  concerning  which  Mr.  Hallam  has  said 
in  our  own  time  that  "  all  which  has  been  since  obtained 
is  little  more  than  as  confirmation  •  or  commentary" — no 
circumstance  was  wanting  of  outward  pageantry  to 
give  dignity,  brilliance,  impressiveness  to  the  scene.  On 
the  one  side  was  the  King,  with  the  Mshops  and 
gentry  who  adhered  to  him,  and  the  Papal  legate  before 
whom  he  had  lately  rendered  his  homage.  On  the  other 
side  was  the  great  and  determined  majority  of  the  barons 


of  England,  with  multitudes  of  knights,  armed  vassals, 
and  retainers.  Stephen  Langton,  Archbishop  of  Canter 
bury,  the  head  of  the  English  clergy,  was  with  them ; 
the  Bishops  of  London,  Winchester,  Lincoln,  Worces 
ter,  Rochester,  and  of  other  great  Sees.  The  Earl 
of  Pembroke,  daring  and  wise,  of  vast  and  increasing 
power  in  the  realm,  was  at  their  head.  Robert  Fitz 
Walter,  whose  fair  daughter  Matilda  the  profligate  King 
had  forcibly  abducted,  was  Marshal  of  the  Army— the 
"Army  of  God  and  the  Holy  Church."  Williaon  Long- 
sword,  Earl  of  Salisbury,  half-brother  of  the  King,  was 
with  the  barons.  The  Earls  of  Albemarle,  Arundel, 
Gloucester,  Hereford,  Norfolk,  Oxford,  were  in  the  array ; 
the  great  Earl  Warrenne,  who  claimed  the  same  right  of 
the  sword  in  his  barony  which  William  the  Conqueror 
had  had  in  the  Kingdom  ;  the  Constable  of  Scotland, 
Hubert  de  Burgh,  Seneschel  of  Poictou,  and  many  othei 
powerful  nobles.  Some  burgesses  of  London  were 
present  as  well ;  and  doubtless  there  mingled  with  the 
throng  those  skillful  clerks  whose  pens  had  drawn  the 
great  instrument  of  freedom,  and  whose  training  in 
language  had  given  a  remarkable  precision  to  its  exact 
clauses  and  cogent  terms. 

Pennons  and  banners  streamed  at  large,  and  spear 
heads  gleamed  above  the  host.  The  Juno  sunshine 
flashed,  reflected  from  iniaid  shields  and  damascened 
armor.  The  terrible  bows  of  the  English  yeomen  hung 
on  their  shoulders.  The  voice  of  trumpets  and  clamoring 
bugles  was  in  the  air.  The  whole  scene  was  va&t  as  a 
battle,  though  bright  as  a  tournament;  splendid,  but 
threatening,  like  burnished  clouds,  in  which  lightnings 
sleep.  The  King,  one  of  the  handsomest  men  of  the 
time,  though  cruelty,  perfidy,  and  every  foul  passion 
must  have  left  their  traces  on  his  face,  was  especially 
fond  of  magnificence  in  dress,  wearing,  we  are  told,  on 
one  Christmas  occasion  a  rich  mantle  of  red  satin,  em 
broidered  with  sapphires  and  pearls,  a  tunic  of  white 
damask,  a  girdle  lustrous  with  precious  stones,  and  a 
baldric  from  his  shoulder,  crossing  his  breast,  set  with 
diamonds  and  emeralds,  while  even  his  gloves— as  indeed 
is  stiH  indicated  on  his  fine  effigy  in  Worcester  Cathedral 
—bore  similar  ornaments,  the  one  a  ruby,  the  other  a 
sapphire. 

Whatever  was  superb,  therefore,  in  that  consummate 
age  of  royal  and  baronial  state,  whatever  was  splendid 
in  the  glittering  and  grand  apparatus  of  chivalry,  what 
ever  was  impressive  in  the  almost  more  than  princely 
pomp  of  the  prelates  of  the  Church— 

The  boast  of  heraldry,  the  pomp  of  power 
And  all  that  beauty,  all  that  wealth  e'er  gave 

—all  this  was  marshaled  on  that  historic  plain  in  Surrey 
where  John  and  the  barons  faced  each  other,  where 
Saxon  King  and  Saxon  Earl  had  met  in  council  before  the 
Norman  had  footing  in  England;  and  all  combined  to 
give  a  fit  magnificence  of  setting  to  the  great  charter 
there  granted  and  sealed. 


llise  of  Constitutional  Liberty — Starrs. 


15 


The  tower  of  Windsor— not  of  the  present  castle  and 
palace,  but  of  the  earlier  detached  fortress  which  already 
crowned  the  cliff,  and  from  which  John  had  come  to  the 
field— looked  down  on  the  scene.  On  the  one  side  low 
hills  inclosed  the  meadow  ;  on  the  other  the  Thames 
flowed  brightly  by,  seeking  the  capital  and  the  sea. 
Every  feature  of  the  scene  was  English,  save  one ;  but 
over  all  loomed,  in  a  portentous  and  haughty  stillness, 
in  the 'ominous  presence  of  the  envoy  from  Rome,  that 
ubiquitous  power,  surpassing  all  others,  which  already 
had  once  laid  the  kingdom  under  interdict,  and  had 
exiled  John  from  Church  and  throne,  but  to  which,  later, 
he  had  been  reconciled,  and  on  which  now  he  secretly 
relied  to  annul  the  charter  which  he  was  granting. 

The  brilliant  panorama  illuminates  the  page  which 
bears  its  story.  It  rises  still  as  a  vision  before  one,  as  he 
looks  on  the  venerable  parchment  originals,  preserved  to 
our  day  in  the  British  Museum.  Tf  it  be  true,  as  Hallam 
has  said,  that  from  that  era  there  was  a  new  soul  in  the 
people  of  England,  it  must  be  confessed  that  the  place, 
the  day,  and  aU  the  circumstances  of  that  new  birth 
were  fitting  to  the  great  and  the  vital  event. 

IV. 

THE   ENGLISH  PETITION  OF  EIGHT. 

That  age  passed  away,  and  its  peculiar  splendor  of 
aspect  was  not  thereafter  to  be  repeated.  Yet  when,  400 
years  later,  on  the  7th  of  June,  1628,  the  Petition  of 
Right,  the  second  great  charter  of  the  liberties  of  En 
gland,  was  presented  by  Parliament  to  Charles  I.,  the 
scene  and  its  accessories  were  hardly  less  impressive. 

Into  that  law— called  a  petition,  as  if  to  mask  the 
deadly  energy  of  its  blow  upon  tyranny— had  been  col 
lected  by  the  skill  of  its  framers  all  the  heads  of  the 
despotic  prerogative  which  Charles  had  exercised,  that 
they  might  all  together  be  smitten  with  one  tremendous 
destroying  stroke.  The  King,  enthroned  in  his  chair  of 
state,  looked  forth  on  those  who  waited  for  his  word,  as 
still  he  looks,  with  his  forecasting  and  melancholy  face, 
from  the  canvas  of  Van  Dyke.  Before  him  were  assem 
bled  the  nobles  of  England— in  peaceful  array,  and  not  in 
armor,  but  with  a  civil  power  in  their  hands  which  the 
older  gauntlets  could  not  have  held,  and  with  the 
memories  of  a  long  renown  almost  as  visible  to  them 
selves  and  to  the  King,  as  were  the  tapestries  suspended 
on  the  walls. 

Crowding  the  bar,  behind  these  descendants  of  the 
earlier  barons,  were  the  members  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  with  whom  the  law  now  presented  to  the  King 
had  had  its  origin,  and  whose  boldness  and  tenacity  had 
constrained  the  peers,  after  vain  endeavor  to  modify  its 
provisions,  to  accept  them  as  they  stood.  They  were  the 
most  powerful  body  of  representatives  of  the  kingdom 
that  had  yet  been  convened ;  possessing  a  private  wealth, 
it  was  estimated,  surpassing  threefold  that  of  the  Peers, 


and  representing  not  less  than  they  the  best  life  and  the 
oldest  lineage  of  the  Kingdom  which  they  loved. 

Their  dexterous,  dauntless,  and  far-sighted  sagacity  i? 
yet  more  evident,  as  we  look  back,  than  their  wealth  or 
their  breeding  ;  and  among  them  were  men  whose  names 
will  be  familiar  while  England  continues.  Wentworth 
was  there,  soon  to  be  the  most  dangerous  of  traitors  to  the 
cause  of  which  he  was  then  the  champion,  but  who 
then  appeared  as  resolute  as  ever  to  vindicate  the  an 
cient,  lawful,  and  vital  liberties  of  the  kingdom ;  and 
Pym  was  there,  who  not  long  after  was  to  warn  the  dark 
and  haughty  apostate  that  he  never  again  would  leave 
pursuit  of  him  so  long  as  his  head  stood  on  his  shoulders 
Hampden  was  there,  considerate  and  serene,  but  inflex 
ible  as  an  oak  ;  once  imprisoned  already  for  his  resistance 
to  an  unjust  taxation,  and  ready  again  to  suffer  and  to 
conquer  in  the  same  supreme  cause.  Sir  John  Eliot  was 
there,  eloquent  and  devoted,  who  had  tasted  also  the 
bitterness  of  imprisonment,  and  who,  after  years  of  its 
subsequent  experience,  was  to  die  a  martyr  in  the  Tower. 
Coke  was  there,  77  years  of  age,  but  full  of  fire  as  full  of 
fame,  whose  vehement  and  unswerving  hand  had  had 
chief  part  in  framing  the  petition.  Selden  was  there,  the 
repute  of  whose  learning  was  already  Continental.  Sir 
Francis  Seymour,  Sir  Robert  Philips,  Strode,  Hobart, 
Denzil  Holies,  and  Valentine— such  were  the  Commoners; 
and  there,  not  impossibly  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  faced 
the  King,  a  silent  young  member  who  had  come  now  to 
his  first  Parliament,  at  the  age  of  29,  from  the  borough  of 
Huntingdon,  Oliver  Cromwell. 

In  a  plain  cloth  suit  he  stood  among  his  colleagues. 
But  they  were  often  splendid  and  even  sumptuous  in 
dress;  with  embroidered  doublets  and  coats  of  velvet, 
with  flowing  collars  of  rich  lace,  the  swords  by  their  sides 
with  flashing  hilts,  their  very  hats  jeweled  and  plumed, 
the  abundant  dressed  and  perfumed  hair  falling  in  curls 
upon  their  shoulders,  Here  und  there  were  those  who 
still  more  distinctly  symbolized  their  spirit  with  steel 
corselets,  overlaid  with  lace  and  rich  embroidery. 

So  stood  they  in  the  presence,  representing  to  the  full 
the  wealth  and  genius  and  stately  civic  pomp  of  England, 
until  the  King  had  pronounced  his  assent,  in  the  express 
customary  form,  to  the  law  which  confirmed  the  popular 
liberties ;  and  when,  on  hearing  his  unequivocal  final  as 
sent,  they  burst  into  loud,  even  passionate,  acclamations 
of  victorious  joy,  there  had  been  from  the  first  no  scene 
more  impressive  in  that  venerable  hall,  whose  history 
went  back  to  Edward  the  Confessor. 

In  what  sharp  contrast  with  the  rich  ceremonial  and 
the  splendid  accessories  of  these  preceding  kindred 
events,  appears  that  modest  scene  at  Philadelphia,  from 
which  we  gratefully  date  to-day  a  hundred  years  of  con 
stant  and  prosperous  national  life  I 


18 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


only  12  colonies  Toted  at  first  for  the  great  Declaration, 
and  that  New-York  was  not  joined  to  the  number  till  live 
days  later.  But  Jay  knew,  and  all  knew,  that,  numerous, 
wealthy,  eminent  in  character,  high  in  position  as  were 
those  here  and  elsewhere  in  the  country— in  Massa 
chusetts,  in  Virginia,  and  in  the  Carolinas— who  were  by 
no  means  yet  prepared  to  sever  their  connection  with 
Great  Britain,  the  general  and  governing  mind  of  the  peo 
ple  was  fixed  upon  this  with  a  decision  which  nothing  could 
•change,  with  a  tenacity  which  nothing  could  break.  The 
forces  tending  to  that  result  had  wrought  to  their  de 
velopment  with  a  steadiness  and  strength  which  the 
stubbornest  resistance  had  hardly  delayed.  The  spirit 
-which  now  shook  light  and  impulse  over  the  land  was 
recent  in  its  precise  demand,  but  as  old  in  its  birth  as  the 
first  Christian  settlements,  and  it  was  that  spirit— not  of 
one,  nor  of  fifty,  not  of  all  the  individuals  in  all  the  con 
ventions,  but  the  vaster  spirit  which  lay  behind— which 
put  itself  on  sudden  record  through  the  prompt  and  ac 
curate  pen  of  Jefferson. 

VI  [I. 
WHY  THE  DECLARATION  WILL  ENDURE. 

He  was  himself  in  full  sympathy  with  it,  and  only  by 
reason tjtf  that  sympathy  could  give  it  such  consummate 
expression.  Not  out  of  books,  legal  researches,  histori 
cal  inquiry,  the  careful  and  various  studies  of  language, 
came  that  document ;  but  out  of  repeated  public  debate, 
cut  of  manifold  personal  and  private  discussion,  out  of 
his  clear,  sympathetic  observation  of  the  changing  feel 
ing  and  thought  of  men,  out  of  that  exquisite  personal 
sensibility  to  vague  and  impalpable  popular  impulses 
which  was  in  him  innately  combined  with  artistic  taste, 
an  ideal  nature  and  rare  power  of  philosophical  thought. 
The  voice  of  the  cottage  as  well  as  the  college,  of  the 
Church  as  well  as  the  legislative  assembly,  was  in  the 
paper.  It  echoed  the  talk  of  the  farmer  in  homespun,  as 
well  as  the  classic  eloquence  of  Lee,  or  the  terrible 
tones  of  Patrick  Henry.  It  gushed  at  last  from  the  pen 
of  its  writer,  like  the  fountain  from  the  roots  of  Lebanon, 
abrhnrniug  river  when  it  issues  from  the  rock ;  but  it 
was  because  its  sources  had  been  supplied,  its  fullness 
filled  by  unseen  springs;  by  the  rivulets  winding  far  up 
among  the  cedars,  and  percolating  through  hidden 
crevices  in  the  stone;  by  melting  snows,  whose  white 
sparkle  seemed  still  on  t  he  stream  ;  by  fierce  rains,  with 
•which  tlie  basins  above  were  drenched  ;  by  even  the 
dews,  silent  and  wide,  which  had  lain  in  stillness  all 
night  upon  the  hill. 

The  Platonic  idea  of  liie  development  of  the  State  was 
thus  realized  here  ;  first  ethics,  then  politics.  A  public 
opinion,  energetic  and  dominant,  took  its  place  from  the 
start  as  the  chief  instrument  of  the  new  civilization.  No 
dashing  maneuvers  of  skillful  commanders,  no  sudden 
burst  of  popular  passion,  was  in  the  Declaration  ;  but  the 
vast  mystery  of  a  supreme  and  imperative  public  life,  at 


once  diffused  and  intense— behind  all  persons,  before  all 
plans,  beneath  which  individual  wills  are  exalted,  at 
whose  touch  the  personal  mind  is  inspired,  and  under 
whose  transcendent  impulse  the  smallest  instrument  be 
comes  of  a  terrific  force.  That  made  the  .Declaration ; 
and  that  makes  it  now,  in  its  modest  brevity,  take  its 
place  with  Magna  Charta  and  the  Petition  of  Right,  as 
full  as  they  of  vital  force,  and  destined  to  a  parallel  per 
manence. 

Because  this  intense  common  life  of  a  determined  and 
manifold  people  has  not  behind  them,  other  documents, 
in  form  similar  to  this,  and  in  polish  and  cadence  of  bal-, 
anced  phrase  perhaps  its  superiors,  have  no  hold  like 
that  which  it  keeps  on  the  memory  of  men.  What  papers 
have  challenged  the  attention  of  men  within  the  century, 
in  the  stately  Spanish  tongue,  in  Mexico,  New-Granada, 
Venezuela,  Bolivia,  or  in  the  Argentine  Republic,  which 
the  people  themselves  now  hardly  remember  ?  How  the 
resonant  proclamations  of  German  or  of  French  Repub 
licans,  of  Hungarian  or  Spanish  revolutionists  and  pat 
riots,  have  vanished  as  sound  absorbed  in  the  air  !  Elo 
quent,  persuasive,  just,  as  they  were,  with  a  vigor  of 
thought,  a  fervor  of  passion,  a  fine  completeness  and 
symmetry  of  expression  in  which  they  could  hardly  be 
surpassed,  they  have  only  now  a  literary  value.  They 
never  became  great  general  forces.  They  were  weak, 
because  they  were  personal :  and  history  is  too  crowded, 
civilization  is  too  vast,  to  take  much  impression  from 
occasional  documents.  Only  then  is  a  paper  of  secular 
force  or  long  remembered  when  behind  it  is  the  ubiquit 
ous  energy  of  the  popular  will,  rolling  through  its  words 
in  vast  diapason,  and  charging  the  clauses  with  tones  of 
thunder. 

Because  such  an  energy  was  behind  it,  our  Declaration 
had  its  majestic  place  and  meaning,  and  they  who 
adopted  it  saw  nowhere  else 

So  ricli  advantage  of  a  promised  g'ory 

AS  smiled  upon  the  forehead  of  their  action. 

Because  of  that  we  read  it  still,  and  look  to  have  it  as 
audible  as  now  among  the  dissonant  voices  of  the  world, 
when  other  generations  in  long  succession  have  come 
and  gone ! 

But  further,  too,  it  mustr  be  observed  that  this  paper, 
adopted  a  hundred  years  since,  was  not  merely  the 
declaration  of  a  people,  as  distinguished  from  eminent 
and  cultured  individuals— a  confession  before  the  world 
of  the  public  State-faith,  rather  than  a  political  thesis— 
but  it  was  also  the  declaration  of  a  people  which  claimed 
for  its  own  a  great  inheritance  of  equitable  laws  and  of 
practical  liberty,  and  which  now  was  intent  to  enlarge 
and  enrich  that.  It  had  roots  iu  the  past  and  a  long 
genealogy,  and  so  it  had  a  vitality  Inherent,  ar.»d  an  im 
mense  energy. 


Rise  of  Constitutional  Liberty — Storrs. 


19 


IX. 
LATENT  FORCES  PUT  IN  ACTION. 

They  who  framed  it  went  back,  indeed,  to  first  princi 
ples.  There  was  something  philosophic  and  ideal  in 
their  scheme,  as  always  there  is  when  the  general  mind 
is  deeply  stirred.  It  was  not  superficial.  Yet  they  were 
not  undertaking  to  establish  new  theories,  or  to  build 
their  State  upon  artificial  plans  and  abstract  specula 
tions.  They  were  simply  evolving  out  of  the  past  what 
therein  had  been  latent ;  were  liberating  into  free  exhibi 
tion  and  unceasing  activity  a  vital  force  older  than  the 
history  of  their  colonization,  and  wide  as  the  lands  from 
which  they  came.  They  had  the  sweep  of  vast  impulses 
behind  them.  The  slow  tendencies  of  centuries  came  to 
sudden  consummation  in  their  Declaration,  and  the  force 
of  its  impact  upon  the  affairs  and  the  mind  of  the  world 
was  not  to  be  measured  by  its  contents  alone,  but  by  the 
relation  in  which  these  stood  to  all  the  vehement  discus 
sion  and  struggle  of  which  it  was  the  latest  outcome. 
This  ought  to  be  always  distinctly  observed. 

The  tendency  is  strong,  and  has  been  general,  among 
those  who  have  introduced  great  changes  in  the  govern 
ment  of  States,  to  follow  some  plan  of  political,  perhaps 
of  social  innovation,  which  enlists  their  judgment,  ex 
cites  their  fancy,  and  to  make  a  comely  theoretical  hab 
itation  for  the  national  household,  rather  than  to  build 
on  the  old  foundations,  expanding  the  walls,  lifting  the 
night,  enlarging  the  doorways,  enlightening  with  new 
windows  the  halls,  but  still  keeping  the  strength  and  re 
newing  the  age,  of  an  old  and  venerated  structure.  You 
remember  how  in  France,  In  1789  and  the  following 
years,  the  schemes  of  those  whom  Napoleon  called  the 
41  ideologists,"  succeeded  each  other,  no  one  of  them  grain 
ing  a  permanent  supremacy,  though  ea<jh  included  im 
portant  elements,  till  the  armed  Consulate  of  1799  swept 
them  all  into  the  air,  and  put  in  place  of  them  one  mas 
terful  genius  and  ambitious  will.  You  remember  how  in 
Spain,  in  1812,  the  new  Constitution  proclaimed  by 
the  Cortes  was  thought  to  inaugurate  with  beneficent 
provisions  a  wh  lly  new  era  of  development  and  prog 
ress;  yet  how  the  history  of  the  splendid  peninsula. 
1'rom  that  day  to  this,  has  been  but  the  record  of  a  strug 
gle  to  the  death  between  the  Old  and  the  New,  the  con 
test  as  desperate,  it  would  seem,  in  our  time  as  it  was  in 
the  first. 

!  It  must  be  so  always  when  a  preceding  state  of  society 
and  government,  which  has  got  itself  established  through 
many  generations,  is  suddenly  superseded  by  a  different 
fabric,  however  more  evidently  conformed  to  right  rea- 
SCQ.  The  principle  is  not  so  strong  as  the  predjudice. 
Habit  masters  invention.  The  new  and  theoretic  shivers 
its  force  on  the  obstinate  coherence  of  tbe  old  and  the 
established.  Tlic  modern  structure  falls  and  is  replaced, 
while  the  grim  feudal  keep,  though  scarred  and  weather 
worn,  tbe  very  .cement  seeming  gone  from  its  walls,  still 


scowls  defiance  at  the  red  right  hand  of  the  lightning 
itself. 

It  was  no  such  rash  speculative  change  which  here  was 
attempted.  The  people  whose  deputies  framed  our 
Declaration  were  largely  themselves  descendants  of  En 
glishmen  ;  and  those  who  were  not  had  lived  long  enough 
under  English  institutions  to  be  impressed  with  their 
tendency  and  spirit.  It  was  therefore  only  natural  that 
even  when  adopting  that  ultimate  measure  which  sev 
ered  them  from  the  British  crown,  they  should  retain  all 
that  had  been  gained  in  the  mother  land  through  centu 
ries  of  endurance  and  strife.  They  left  nothing  that  was 
good  ;  they  abolished  the  bad,  added  the  needful,  and  de 
veloped  into  a  rule  for  the  continent  the  splendid  pre 
cedents  of  great  former  occasions.  They  shared  still  the 
boast  of  Englishmen  that  their  Constitution  "has  no 
single  date  from  which  its  duration  is  to  be  reckoned," 
and  that  "  the  origin  of  the  English  law  is  as  undiscov- 
erable  as  that  of  the  Nile."  They  went  back  themselves 
for  the  origin  of  their  liberties  to  the  most  ancient  muni 
ments  of  English  freedom.  Jefferson  had  affirmed,  in 
1774,  that  a  primitive  charter  of  American  Independ 
ence  lay  in  the  fact  that  as  the  Saxons  had  left  their  na 
tive  wilds  in  the  North  of  Europe,  and  had  occupied 
Britain — the  country  which  they  left  asserting  over  them 
no  further  co itrol,  nor  any  dependence  of  them  upon  it 
— so  the  Englishmen  coming  hither  had  formed,  by  that 
act,  another  State  over  which  Parliament  had  no  rights, 
in  which  its  laws  were  void  till  accepted. 

X. 

ENGLISH  IDEAS  PRESERVED. 
But  while  seeking  for  their  liberties  so  archaic  a  basis, 
neither  he  nor  his  colleagues  were  in  the  least  careless  of 
what  subsequent  times  had  done  to  complete  them. 
There  was  not  one  element  of  popular  right,  which  had 
been  wrested  from  the  crown  and  nobles  in  any  age, 
which  they  did  not  keep;  not  an  equitable  rule  for  the 
transfer  or  the  division  of  property,  for  the  protection  of 
personal  rights,  or  for  the  detection  and  punishment  of 
crime,  which  was  not  precious  in  their  eyes.  Even 
chancery  jurisdiction  they  retained,  with  the  distinct 
tribunals,  derived  from  the  ecclesiastical  courts,  for  pro 
bate  of  wills,  and  the  English  tsclmicalities  were  main 
tained  in  the  courts  almost  as  if  they  were  sacred  things. 
Especially  that  of  equality  of  civil  rights  among  all  com 
moners,  which  Hallam  declares  the  most  prominent 
characteristic  of  the  English  Constitution— the  source  of. 
its  permanence,  its  improvement,  and  its  vigor— they  per 
fectly  retained;  they  only  more  sharply  affirmatively  de 
clared  it.  And  even  in  renouncing  their  allegiance  to  theJ 
King,  and  putting  the  United  Colonies  in  his  place,  they' 
felt  themselves  acting  in  intimate  harmony  with  thespiriti 
and  drift  of  the  ancient  Constitution.  The  Executive" 
here  was  to  be  elective,  not  hereditary,  to  be  limited  and 
not  permanent  in  the  term  of  his  functions ;  and  no' 


20 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


established  peerage  should  exist.  But  each  State  re 
tained  its  Governor,  Legislature,  its  ancient  statute  and 
common  law ;  and  if  they  had  been  challenged  for  En 
glish  authority  for  their  attitude  toward  the  Crown  they 
might  have  replied  in  the  words  of  Bracton,  the  Lord 
Chief -Justice,  500  years  before,  under  the  reign  of  Henry 
III.,  that  the  law  makes  the  King  :  "  There  is  no  King 
where  will  and  not  law  bears  rule ;"  "  if  the  King  were 
without  a  bridle,  that  is  the  law,  they  ought  to  put  a 
bridle  upon  him."  They  might  have  replied  in  the  words 
of  Fox,  speaking  in  Parliament  in  daring  defiance  of  the 
temper  of  the  House,  but  with  many  supporting  him, 
when  he  said  that  in  declaring  independence  they  [the 
Americans]  "  had  done  no  more  than  the  English  had 
done  against  James  II." 

They  had  done  no  more ;  though  they  had  not  elected 
another  King  in  place  of  him  whom  they  renounced. 
They  had  taken  no  step  so  far  in  advance  of  the  then 
existing  English  Constitution  as  these  which  the  Parlia 
ment  of  1640  took  in  advance  of  the  previous  Parliaments 
which  Charles  had  dissolved.  If  there  was  a  right  more 
rooted  than  another  in  that  Constitution,  it  was  the  right 
of  the  people  which  was  taxed  to  have  its  vote  in  the 
taxing  Legislature.  If  there  was  anything  more 
accordant  than  another  with  its  historic  temper  and 
tenor,  it  was  that  the  authority  of  the  King  was  deter 
mined  when  his  rule  became  tyrannous.  Jefferson  had 
but  perfectly  expressed  the  doctrine  of  the  lovers  of 
freedom  in  England  for  many  generations  when  he  said 
in  his  "  Summary  View  of  the  Rights  of  America,"  in 
1774,  that  "  the  monarch  is  no  more  than  the  chief  officer 
of  the  people,  appointed  by  the  laws,  and  circumscribed 
with  definite  powers,  to  assist  in  working  the  great 
machine  of  government,  erected  far  their  use,  and,  con 
sequently,  subiect  to  their  superintendence;"  that 
"  Kings  are  the  servants,  not  the  proprietors,  of  the 
people,"  and  that  a  nation  claims  its  rights  "  as  derived 
from  the  laws  of  nature,  not  as  the  gift  of  their  chief 
magistrate." 

That  had  been  the  spirit,  if  not  as  yet  the  formulated 
doctrine  of  Raleigh,  Hampden,  Russel,  Sidney—of  all  the 
great  leaders  of  liberty  in  England.  Milton  had  declared 
it  in  a  prose  as  majestic  as  any  passage  of  the  Paradise 
Lost.  The  Common  wealth  had  been  built  on  it,  and  the 
whole  Revolution  of  1638.  And  they  who  now  framed  it 
into  their  permanent  organic  law,  and  made  it  supreme 
in  the  country  they  were  shaping,  were  in  harmony  with 
the  noblest  inspirations  of  the  past.  They  were  not  in 
novating  with  a  rash  recklessness.  They  were  simply 
accepting  and  reaffirming  what  they  had  learned  from 
luminous  events  and  illustrious  men.  So  their  work  had 
a  dignity,  a  strength,  and  a  permanence,  which  can  never 
belong  to  mere  fresh  speculations,  ft  interlocked  with 
that  of  multitudes  going  before.  It  derived  a  virtue 
from  every  field  of  struggle  in  Eiig?$ttd;  iroiu  eve*y 
scaflold  hallowed  by  free  ami  consecrated  blood;  from 


every  hour  of  great  debate.  It  was  only  the  complete 
development  into  law  for  a  separated  people  of  that 
august  ancestral  liberty,  the  eerms  of  which  had  pre 
ceded  the  Heptarchy,  the  gradual  defiuitiou  and  estab 
lishment  of  which  had  been  the  glory  of  English  his 
tory.  A  thousand  years  brooded  over  the  room  where 
they  asserted  hereditary  rights.  Its  walls  showed 
neither  portraits  nor  mottoes ;  but  the  Kaiser-saal  at 
Frankfurt  was  not  hung  around  with  such  recollections. 
No  titles  were  worn  by  those  plain  men;  but  there  had 
not  been  one  knightly  soldier  or  one  patriotic  and  pres 
cient  statesman,  standing  for  liberty  in  the1  splendid 
centuries  of  its  English  growth,  who  did  not  touch  them 
with  unseen  accolade  and  bid  them  be  faithful.  The 
paper  which  they  adopted,  fresh  from  the  pen  of  its 
young  author,  and  written  on  his  hired  piue-table,  was 
already,  in  essential  life,  of  a  venerable  age;  and  it  took 
immense  impulse,  it  derived  an  instant  and  vast  author 
ity  from  its  relation  to  that  undying  past  in  which  they 
too  had  grand  inheritance,  and  from  which  their  public 
life  had  come. 

Englishmen  themselves  now  recognize  this,  and  olteii 
are  proud  of  it.  The  distinguished  representative  of 
Great  Britain  at  Washington  may  think  his  Government, 
as  no  doubt  he  does,  superior  to  ours,  but 'his  clear  eye 
cannot  fail  to  see  that  English  liberty  was  the  parent  of 
ours,  and  that  the  new  and  broader  continent  here 
opened  before  it  suggested  that  expansion  of  it  which  we 
celebrate  to-day.  His  ancestors,  like  ours,  helped  to 
build  the  Republic;  and  its  faithfulness  to  the  past,  amid 
all  inaovatious,  was  one  great  secret  of  its  earliest  tri 
umph,  has  been  one  source  from  that  day  to  this  of  its 
enduring  and  prosperous  strength. 

XL 
THE  EIGHT  OF  REVOLUTION. 

The  Congress,  and  the  people  behind  it,  asserted  for 
themselves  hereditary  liberties,  and  hazarded  everything 
in  the  purpose  to  complete  them.  But  they  also  affirmed 
with  emphasis  and  effect  another  right,  more  general 
than  this,  which  made  their  action  significant  and  impor 
tant  to  other  people ;  which  made  it  indeed  a  signal  to 
the  nations  of  the  right  of  each  to  assert  for  itself  the 
just  prerogative  of  forming  its  government,  electing  its 
rulers,  ordaining  its  laws,  as  might  to  it  seem  most  expe 
dient.  Hear  ag:iin  the  immortal  words  :  "  We  hold  these 
truths  to  be  self-evident:  *  *  *  that  to  secure  these 
fiualieuable]  rights,  governments  are  instituted  ainoiig 
men,  deriving  their  just  powers  from  the  consent  of  the 
governed;  that  whenever  any  form  of  go veruuient  be 
comes  destructive  of  these  ends,  it  is  the  right  of  the 
people  to  alter  or  abolish  it,  and  to  institute  new  govern 
ment,  laying  its  foundations  in  such  principles,  and 
organizing  its  powers  in  such  form,  as  to  them  shall 
seem  most  likely  to  effect  their  safety  and  happiness." 

This  is  what  the  party  of  Bentham  called  "the  assurnp- 


Rise  of  Constitutional  Liberty — titorrs. 


21 


tion  of  natural  rights,  claimed  without  the  slightest  evi 
dence  of  their  existence,  and  supported  by  vague  and 
declamatory  generalities."  This  is  what  we  receive  as 
the  decisive  and  noble  declaration,  spoken  with  the  sim 
plicity  of  a  perfect  conviction,  of  a  natural  right  as  patent 
as  the  continent ;  a  declaration  which  challenged  at  once 
the  attention  of  mankind,  and  which  now  is  practically 
assumed  as  a  premise  in  international  relations  and  pub 
lic  law. 

Of  course,  it  was  not  a  new  discovery.  It  was  old  as 
the  earliest  of  political  philosophers ;  as  old,  indeed,  as 
the  earliest  communities,  which  becoming  established  in 
particular  locations  had  there  developed  their  own  insti 
tutions,  and  repelled  with  vehemence  the  assaults  that 
would  change  them.  But  in  the  growth  of  political  socie 
ties,  and  the  vast  expansion  of  imperial  States,  by  the 
conquest  of  those  adjacent  and  weaker,  the  right,  so 
easily  recognized  at  the  outset,  so  german  to  the  in 
stincts,  so  level  with  the  reason  of  every  community,  had 
widely  passed  out  of  men's  thoughts ;  and  the  power 
of  a  conquering  State  to  change  the  institutions  and 
laws  of  a  people,  or  impose  on  it  new  ones— the 
power  of  a  parent  State  to  shape  the  forms  and  prescribe 
the  rules  of  the  colonies  which  went  from  it— had  been 
so  long  and  abundantly  exercised  that  the  very  right  of 
the  people  thus  conquered  or  colonial,  to  consult  its  own 
interests  in  the  frame  of  its  Government, had  been  almost 
forgotten.  It  might  be  a  high  speculation  of  scholars  or 
a.  charming  dream  of  political  enthusiasts.  But  it  was 
rot  a  maxim  for  the  practical  statesman ;  and  whatever 
its  cori'ectness  as  an  ideal  principle,  it  was  vain  to  expect 
to  see  it  established  in  a  world  full  of  Kings,  who  claimed 
each  for  himself  an  authority  from  God,  and  full  of 
States  intent  on  grasping  and  governing  by  their  law 
adjacent  domains.  The  revolt  of  the  Netherlands 
against  Spanish  domination  had  been  the  one  instance 
in  modern  history  in  which  the  inherent  right  of  a  people 
to  suit  itself  in  the  frame  of  its  government  had  been 
proclaimed  and  then  maintained  ;  and  that  had  been  a 
paroxysmal  revolt  against  tyranny  so  crushing  and  cruel- 
tics  so  savage  that  they  took  it  out  of  the  line  of  examples. 
The  Dutch  Republic  was  almost  as  exceptional,  through 
the  fierce  wickedness  which  had  crowded  it  into  being, as 
•was  Switzerland  itself  on  its  Alpine  hights.  For  an 
ordinary  State  to  claim  self-regulation,  and  found  its 
Government  on  a  plebiscite,  was  to  contradict  precedent, 
and  to  set  at  defiance  European  tradition. 

Our  fathers,  however,  in  a  somewhat  vague  way,  had 
held  from  the  start  that  they  had  right  to  an  autonomy, 
and  that  acts  of  Parliament  and  appointments  of  the 
Crown  took  proper  effect  upon  these  shores  only  by 
reason  of  their  assent.  Their  charters  were  held  to  eon- 
linn  this  doctrine.  This  conviction,  at  first  practical  and 
instinctive  rather  than  theoretic,  had  grown  with  their 
growth,  and  bad  been  intensified  into  positive  affirma 
tion  and  public  exhibition  as  the  British  lule  infringed 


more  sharply  on  their  interests  and  their  hopes.  It  had 
finally  become  the  general  and  decisive  conviction  of 
the  colonies.  It  had  spoken  already  in  armed  resistance 
to  the  troops  of  the  King.  It  had  been  articulated,  with 
gathering  emphasis,  lu  many  resolves  of  assemblies  and 
conventions.  I^was  now  finally,  most  energetically,  set 
forth  to  the  world  in  the  great  Declaration  ;  and  in  that 
utterance,  made  general  not  particular,  and  founding  the 
rights  of  the  people  in  this  country  on  principles  as  wide 
as  humanity  itself,  there  lay  an  appeal  to  every  nation— 
an  appeal  whose  words  took  unparalleled  force,  were  illu 
minated  and  made  rubrical,  in  the  fire  and  blood  of  the 
following  war. 

When  the  Emperor  Ferdinand  visited  Innsbruck— that 
beautiful  town  of  the  Austrian  Tyrol— in  1838,  it  is  said 
that  the  inhabitants  wrote  his  name  in  immense  bonfires 
along  the  sides  of  the  precipitous  hills  which  shelter  the 
town.  Over  a  space  of  four  or  five  miles  extended  that 
colossal  illumination,  till  the  heavens  seemed  on  fire  in 
the  far-reflected,  up-streaming  glow.  The  right  of  a 
people,  separated  from  others,  to  its  own  institutions— 
our  fathers  wrote  this  in  lines  so  vivid  and  so  large  that 
the  whole  world  could  see  them ;  and  they  followed  that 
writing  with  the  consenting  thunders  of  so  many  cannon 
that  even  the  lands  across  the  Atlantic  were  shaken  and 
filled  with  the  long  reverberation. 

XII. 
REVOLT    AGAINST    DIVINE    RIGHT. 

The  doctrine  had,  of  course,  in  every  State  its  two-fold 
internal  application,  as  well  as  its  front  against  external 
powers.  On  the  one  hand  it  swept  with  destroying  force 
against  the  notion  so  long  maintained  of  the  right  of 
certain  families  in  the  world,  called  Hapsburg,  Bour 
bon,  Stuart,  or  whatever,  to  govern  the  rest ;  and  wher 
ever  it  was  received  it  made  the  imagined  Divine  Right 
of  Kings  an  obsolete  and  contemptible  fiction.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  smote  with  equal  energy  against  the  pre 
tensions  of  any  minority  within  the  State,  whether 
banded  together  by  the  ties  of  descent,  or  of  neighbor 
hood  in  location,  or  of  common  opinion,  or  supposed 
common  interest,  to  govern  the  rest ;  or  even  to  impair 
the  established  and  paramount  government  of  the  rest 
by  separating  themselves  organically  from  it. 

It  was  never  the  doctrine  of  the  fathers  that  the  people 
of  Kent,  Cornwall,  or  Lincoln,  might  sever  themselves 
from  the  rest  of  England,  and  while  they  had  their  voice 
and  vote  in  the  public  councils  might  assert  the  right  to 
govern  the  whole,  under  threat  of  withdrawal  if  their 
minor  vote  were  not  suffered  to  control.  They  were  not 
seeking  to  initiate  anarchy,  and  to  make  it  thenceforth 
respectable  in  the  world  by  support  of  their  suffragee. 
They  recognized  the  fact  that  the  State  exists  to  meet  per 
manent  needs,  is  the  ordinance  of  God  as  well  as  the 
family  ;  and  that  He  has  determined  the  bounds  of  men's 
habitation,  by  rivers,  seas,  and  mountain  chains,  shaping 


Independence  Day  Orations.  July  4.  1876. 


countries  as  well  as  continents  into  physical  coherence, 
while  giving  one  man  his  birth  on  the  north  of  the  Pyre 
nees,  another  on  the  south,  one  on  the  terraced  banks  of 
the  Rhine,  another  in  English  meadow  or  upland.  They 
saw  that  a  common  and  fixed  habitation,  in  a  country 
thus  physically  defined,  especially  when  combined  with 
community  of  descent,  of  permanent  public  interest,  and 
of  the  language  on  which  thought  is  interchanged— that 
these  make  a  people  ;  and  such  a  people,  as  a  true  and 
abiding  body-politic,  they  affirmed  had  right  to  shape  its 
government,  forbidding  others  to  intermeddle. 

But  it  must  bo  the  general  mind  of  the  people  which 
determined  the  questions  thus  involved;  not  a  dictating 
class  within  the  State,  whether  known  as  peers  or  asso 
ciated  commoners,  whether  scattered  widely,  as  one 
among  several  political  parties,  or  grouped  together  in 
some  one  section,  and  having  a  special  interest  to  en 
courage.  The  decision  of  the  general  public  mind,  as  de 
liberately  reached,  and  authentically  declared,  that  must 
be  the  end  of  debate ;  and  the  right  of  resistance,  or  the 
right  of  division,  after  that,  if  such  right  exist,  it  is  not 
to  be  vindicated  from  their  Declaration.  Any  one  who 
thought  such  government  by  the  whole  intolerable  to 
Lim  was  always  at  liberty  to  expatriate  himself,  and  find 
elsewhere  such  other  institutions  as  he  might  prefer. 
But  he  could  not  tarry,  and  still  not  submit.  He  was  not 
a  monarch,  without  the  crown,  before  whose  contrary 
ludgment  and  will  the  public  councils  must  be  dumb. 
While  dwelling  in  the  land  and  having  the  same  opportu 
nity  with  others  to  seek  the  amendment  of  what  he  dis 
approved,  the  will  of  the  whole  was  binding  upon  him  ; 
and  that  obligation  he  could  not  vacate  by  refusing  to 
accept  it.  If  one  could  not,  neither  could  ten,  nor  a  hun 
dred,  uor  a  million,  who  still  remained  a  minority  of  the 
whole. 

To  allow  such  a  right  would  have  been  to  make  govern 
ment  transparently  impossible.  Not  separate  sections 
only,  but  counties,  townships,  school  districts,  neighbor 
hoods,  must  have  the  same  right;  and  each  individual, 
with  his  own  will  for  his  final  law,  must  be  the  complete 
ultimate  State. 

It  was  no  such  disastrous  folly  which  the  fathers  of  our 
Republic  affirmed.  They  ruled  out  kings,  princes,  peers, 
from  any  control  over  the  people ;  and  they  did  »ot  give 
to  a  transient  minority,  wherever  it  might  appear,  on 
whatever  question,  a  greater  privilege,  because  less  de 
fined,  than  that  which  they  jealously  withheld  from  these 
classes.  Such  a  tyranny  of  irresponsible  occasional  mi 
norities  would  have  seemed  to  them  only  more  intolera 
ble  than  that  of  classes  organized,  permanent,  and  lim 
ited  by  law.  And  when  it  was  affirmed  by  some,  and 
silently  feared  by  many  others,  that  in  our  late  immense 
civil  war  the  States  which  adhered  to  the  old  Constitu 
tion  had  forgotten  or  discarded  the  principles 
of  the  earlier  Declaration,  those  assertions  and 
fears  were  alike  without  reason.  The  people  which 


adopted  the  Declaration  when  distributed  into 
colonies,  was  the  people  which  afterward  established  the 
Confederation  of  1781,  imperfect  enough,  but  whose 
abiding  renown  it  is  that  under  it  the  war  was  ended.  It 
was  the  same  people  which  framed  the  Constitution 
when  compacted  into  States.  "  We  the  people  of  the 
United  States,"  do  ordain  and  establish  the  following: 
Constitution,  so  runs  the  majestic  and  vital  instrument- 
It  contains  provisions  for  its  own  emendation.  When 
the  people  will  they  may  set  it  aside,  and  put  in  place  of 
it  one  wholly  different ;  and  no  other  nation  can  inter 
vene.  But  while  it  continues,  it  and  the  laws  made 
normally  under  it  are  not  subject  to  resistance  by  a  por 
tion  of  the  people  conspiring  to  direct  or  limit  the  rest, 
And,  whensoever  any  pretension  like  this  shall  appear, 
if  ever  again  it  does  appear,  it  will  undoubtedly  as  in 
stantly  appear  that  even  as  in  the  past  so  in  the  future, 
the  people,  whose  the  Government  is,  and  whose  com 
plete  and  magnificent  domain  God  has  marked  out  for  itr 
will  subdue  resistance,  compel  submission,  forbid  seces 
sion,  though  it  cost  again,  as  it  cost  before,  four  years  of 
war,  with  treasure  uncounted  and  inestimable  life. 

The  right  of  a  people  upon  its  own  territory,  as  equally 
against  any  classes  within  it  or  any  external  powers, 
this  is  the  doctrine  of  our  Declaration.  We  know  how  it 
here  has  been  applied,  and  how  settled  it  is  upon  these 
shores  for  the  time  to  come.  liVe  know,  too,  something 
of  what  impression  it  instantly  made  upon  tne  minds  of 
other  peoples,  and  how  they  sprang  to  greet  and  accept 
it.  In  the  fine  image  of  Bancroft,  "the  astonished 
nations,  as  they  read  that  all  men  are  created  equal, 
started  out  of  their  lethargy,  like  those  who  have  been 
exiles  from  childhood,  when  they  suddenly  hear  the 
dimly-remembered  accents  of  their  mother-tongue." 

XIII. 

AMERICA'S  INFLUENCE  ON  HISTORY. 
The  theory  of  scholars  was  now  become  the  maxim  of 
a  State.  The  diffused  ineffectual  nebulous  light  had  got 
itself  concentrated  into  an  orb ;  and  the  radiance  of  it,, 
penetrating  and  hot,  shone  afar.  You  know  how  France 
responded  to  it ;  with  passionate  speed  seeking  to  be  rid 
of  the  terrific  establishments  in  Church  and  State  which, 
had  nearly  crushed  the  life  of  the  people,  and  with  a. 
beautiful  though  credulous  unreason  trying  to  lift  by 
the  grasp  of  the  law  into  intelligence  and  political 
capacity  the  masses  whose  training  for  thirteen  cen- 
tures  had  been  despotic.  No  operation  of  natural  law 
was  any  more  certain  than  the  failure  of  that  too  daring 
experiment.  But  the  very  failure  involved  progress  from 
it— involved,  undoubtedly,  that  ultimate  success  which 
it  was  vain  to  try  to  extemporize.  Certainly  the  other 
European  powers  will  not  again  intervene,  as  they  did, 
to  restore  a  despotism  which  France  had  abjured,  and 
with  forei£  n  bayonets  to  uphold  institutions  which  it 
does  not  desire.  Italy.  Spain,  Germany,  England— they 


are  not  republican  in  the  form  of  their  government,  nor 
aa  yet  democratic  in  the  distribution  of  powers.  But 
each  of  them  is  as  full  of  this  organic,  self-demonstrating 
doctrine  as  js  our  own  land ;  and  England  would  send  no 
troops  to  Canada  to  compel  its  submission  if  it  should 
decide  to  set  up  for  itself.  Neither  Italy  nor  Spaiu  would 
maintain  a  monarchy  a  moment  longer  than  the  general 
mind  of  the  country  preferred  it.  Germany  would  be 
fused  in  the  fire  of  one  passion  if  any  foreign  nation 
whatever  should  assume  to  dictate  the  smallest  change 
In  one  of  its  laws. 

The  doctrine  of  the  proper  prerogative  of  Kings,  de 
rived  from  God,  which  in  the  last  century  was  more  com 
mon  in  Europe  than  the  doctrine  of  the  centrality  of  the 
sun  in  our  planetary  system,  is  now  as  obsolete  among 
the  intelligent  as  are  the  epicycles  of  Ptolemy.  Every 
government  expects  to  stand  henceforth  by  assent  of  the 
governed,  and  by  no  otherclaim  or  right.  It  is  strong  by 
beneficence,  not  by  tradition,  and  at  the  hight  of  its  mil 
itary  successes  it  circulates  appeals  and  canvasses  for 
ballots.  Revolution  is  carefully  sought  to  be  averted  by 
timely  and  tender  amelioration  of  the  laws.  The  most 
progressive  and  liberal  States  are  most  evidently  secure, 
while,  those  which  stand,  like  olive  trees  at  Tivoli,  with 
feeble  arms  supported  on  pillows  and  hollow  trunks 
filled  up  with  stone,  are  palpably  only  temptiug  the 
blast.  An  alliance  of  sovereigns,  like  that  called  the 
Holy,  for  reconstructing  the  map  of  Europe,  and  parcel 
ing  out  the  passive  peoples  among  separate  governments, 
would  to-day  be  no  more  possible  than  would  Charle 
magne's  plan  for  reconstructing  the  Empire  of  the  West. 
Even  Murad,  Sultan  of  Turkey,  now  takes  the  place  of 
Abdul,  the  deposed,  "  by  the  Grace  of  God  and  the  will  ot 
the  people;"  and  that  accomplished  and  illustrious 
prince,  whose  empire  under  the  Southern  Cross  rivals  our 
own  in  its  extent,  and  most  nearly  approaches  it  on  this 
hemisphere  in  stability  of  institutions  and  in  practical 
freedom,  has  his  surest  title  to  the  throne  which  he 
honors  in  his  wise  liberality,  and  his  faithful  endeavor 
for  the  good  of  his  people.  As  long  as  in  this  he  con 
tinues  as  now  a  recognized  leader  among  the  monarchy — 
ready  to  take  and.  seek  suggestions  from  even  a  demo 
cratic  Republic— his  throne  will  be  steadfast  as  the 
water-sheds  of  Brazil ;  and  while  his  successors  maintain 
his  spirit  no  domestic  insurrections  will  test  the  Question 
whether  they  retain  that  celerity  in  movement  with  which 
Dom  Pedro  has  astonished  Americans. 

It  is  no  more  possible  to  reverse  this  tendency  toward 
popular  sovereignty,  and  to  substitute  for  it  the  right  of 
families,  classes,  minorities,  or  of  intervening  foreign 
States,  than  it  is  to  arrest  the  motion  of  the  earth,  and 
make  it  swing  the  other  way  in  its  annual  orbit.  In  thia, 
at  least,  our  fathers'  Declaration  has  made  its  impression 
oa  the  history  of  mankind. 

It  was  the  act  of  a  people  and  not  of  persons,  except  as 


Else  of  Constitutional  Liberty— Storrs.  23 

not  starting  out  on  new  theories  of  government  so  much 
as  developing  into  forms  of  law  and  practical  force  a 
great  and  gradual  inheritance  of  freedom.  It  was  the 
act  of  a  people  declaring  for  others  as  for  itself  the  right 
of  each  to  its  own  form  of  government  without  interfer 
ence  from  other  nations,  without  restraint  by  privileged 
classes. 

XIV. 

HLLPS  TO  THE  PROGRESS  OF  MANKIND. 

It  only  remains,  taeu,  to  ask  the  question  now  far  it  has 
contributed  to  the  peace,  the  advancement,  and.  the  per 
manent  welfare  of  the  people  by  which  it  was  set  forth— 
of  other  nations  which  it  has  affected.  And  to  ask  thii 
question  is  almost  to  answer  it.  The  answer  is  as  evi 
dent  as  the  sun  in  the  heavens. 

It  cannot  certainly  be  affirmed  that  we  in  America,  any 
more  than  persons  or  peoples  elsewhere,  have  reached  a* 
yet  the  ideal  state  of  private  liberty  combined  with  a  per 
fect  public  order,  or  of  culture  complete  and  a  supreme 
character.  The  political  world,  as  well  as  the  religious, 
since  Christ  was  on  earth,  looks  forward,  not  backward, 
for  its  niillennium.  That  golden  age  is  still  to  coino 
which  is  to  shine  in  the  perfect  splendor  reflected  from 
Him  who  is  ascended;  and  no  prophecy  tells  us  how  long 
before  the  advancing  race  shall  reach  and  cross  its  glow 
ing  marge,  or  what  long  effort,  or  what  tumults  of  battle, 
are  still  to  precede. 

In  this  country,  too,  there  have  been  immense  special 
impediments  to  hinder  wide  popular  progress  in  thing* 
which  are  highest.  Our  people  have  had  a  continent  to- 
subdue.  They  have  been  from  the  start  in  constant  mi 
gration.  Westward,  from  the  counties  of  the  Hudson 
and  the  Mohawk,  around  the  lakes,  over  the  prairies, 
across  the  great  river;  westward  still,  over  alkali  plains, 
across  terrible  canons,  up  gorges  of  the  mountains  where* 
hardly  the  wild  goat  could  find  footing ;  westward  al 
ways,  till  the  Golden  Gate  opened  out  ou  the  sea  which 
has  been  made  10,000  miles  wide,  as  if  nothing  less  could 
stop  the  march — this  has  been  the  popular  movement 
Irorn  almost  the  day  of  the  great  Declaration.  To-mor 
row's  tents  have  been  pitched  in  new  fields,  and  last 
year's  houses  await  new  possessors. 

With  such  constant  change,  such  wide  dislocation  of 
the  mass  of  the  people  from  early  and  settled  home  as 
sociations,  and  with  the  incessant  occupation  of  the 
thoughts  by  the  great  physical  problems  presented — not 
so  much  by  any  struggle  for  existence  as  by  harvests  for 
which  the  prairies  waited,  by  mills  for  which  the  rivers 
clamored,  by  the  coal  and  the  gold  which  offered  them 
selves  to  the  grasp  of  the  miner— it  would  not  have  been 
strange  if  a  great  and  dangerous  decadence  had  occurred 
in  that  domestic  and  private  virtue  of  which  home  is  the 
nursery,  in  that  generous  and  reverent  public  spirit 
which  is  but  the  effluence  of  its  combined  rays.  It  would 
have  been  wholly  too  much  to  expect  that,  under  such 


these  represented  and  led  it.    It  was  the  act  of  a  people 


influences,  the  highest  progress  should  have  been  re- 


24 

alizcd  in  speculative  tliouglit,  in  artistic  culture,  or  in  the 
researches  of  pure  science. 

Accordingly,  we  find  that  in  these  departments'  not 
enough  has  been  accomplished  to  make  our  progress 
signal  in  them,  though  here  and  there  the  eminent  souls, 
"  that  are  like  stars  and  dwell  apart,"  have  illumined 
themes  highest  with  their  high  interpretations.  But 
history  has  been  cultivated  among  us  with  an  enthusiasm, 
to  an  extent  hardly  I  think  to  have  been  anticipated 
among  a  people  so  recent  and  expectant ;  and  Prescott, 
Motley,  Irving,  Ticknor,  with  him  upon  whose  splendid 
page  all  American  history  has  been  amply  illustrated,  are 
known  as  familiarly  and  honored  as  highly  in  Eu 
rope  as  here.  We  have  had,  as  well,  distinguished 
poets,  and  have  them  now,  to  whom  the  nation  has 
been  respo'.  ,ive,  through  whom  the  noblest  poems  of 
the  Old  World  have  come  into  the  English  toiigue,  ren 
dered  in  fit  and  perfect  music,  and  some  of  whose  minds, 
blossoming  long  ago  in  the  solemn  and  beautiful  fancies 
of  youth,  with  perennial  energy  still  ripen  to  new  fruit 
as  they  near  or  cross  their  four  score  years.  In  medicine 
and  law,  as  well  aa  in  theology,  in  fiction,  biography, 
and  the  vivid  narrative  of  exploration  and  discovery,  the 
people  whose  birthday  we  commemorate  has  added 
something  to  the  possession  of  men.  Its  sculptors  and 
painters  have  won  high  places  in  the  brilliant  realm  of 
modern  art.  Publicists  like  Wheaton,  jurists  like  Kent, 
have  gained  a  celebrity  reflecting  honor  on  the  land ; 
and  if  no  orator  so  vast  in  knowledge,  so  profound  and 
discursive  in  philosophical  thought,  so  affluent  in  im 
agery,  and  so  glorious  in  diction  as  Edmund  Burke  has 
yet  appeared,  we  must  remember  that  centuries  were 
needed  to  produce  him  elsewhere,  and  that  any  of  the 
great  Parliamentary  debaters,  aside  from  him,  have  been 
matched  or  surpassed  in  the  hearing  of  those  who  have 
hung  with  rapt  sympathetic  attention  on  the  lips  of 
Clay  or  of  Rufus  Choate,  or  have  felt  themselves  listen 
ing  to  the  mightiest  mind  which  ever  touched  theirs 
when  they  stood  beneath  the  imperial  voice  in  which 
Webster  spoke. 

In  applied  science  there  has  been  much  done  in  the 
country,  for  which  the  world  admits  itself  our  grateful 
debtor.  I  need  not  multiply  illustrations  of  this  from 
locomotives,  printing  presses,  sewing-machines,  revol 
vers,  steam  reapers,  bank  locks.  One  instance  suffices, 
most  signal  of  all.  When  Morse,  from  Washington, 
32  years  ago,  sent  over  the  wires  his  word  to  Baltimore, 
"What hath  God  wrought,"  he  had  given  to  all  the  na 
tions  of  mankind  an  instrument  the  most  sensitive,  ex 
pansive,  quickening,  which  the  world  yet  possesses.  He 
bad  bound  the  earth  in  electric  network. 

England  touches  India  to-day,  and  France  Algeria, 
while  we  are  in  contact  with  all  the  continents  upon  these 
scarcely  perceptible  nerves.  The  great  strategist  like 
Von  Moltke,  with  these  in  his  hands,  from  the  silence  of 
his  office  directs  campaigns,  dictates  marches,  wins  vic- 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 

tories  ;  the  statesman  in  the  Cabinet  Inspires  ai»d  regu 
lates  the  distant  diplomacies;  while  the  traveler  in  any 
poit  or  mart  is  by  the  same  marvel  of  mechanism  in  in 
stant  communication  with  all  centers  of  commerce.  It 
Is  certainlv  not  too  much  to  say  that  no  other  invention 
of  the  world  in  this  century  has  so  richly  deserved  the 
medals,  crosses,  and  diamond  decorations,  the  applause 
of  senates,  the  gifts  of  kings,  which  have  been  showered 
upon  its  author,  as  did  this  invention,  which  finally 
taught  and  utilized  the  lightnings  whose  nature  a  signer 
of  the  great  Declaration  had  made  apparent. 

XV. 
INDIVIDUAL  ADVANCEMENT. 

But  after  all  it  is  not  so  much  in  special  inventions,  or 
in  eminent  attainments  made  by  individuals,  that  we  are 
to  find  the  answer  to  the  question,  "  What  did  that  day, 
a  hundred  years  since,  accomplish  for  us  ?"  Still  less  is 
it  found  in  the  progress  we  have  made  in  outward  wealth 
and  material  success.  This  might  have  been  made,  ap 
proximately  at  least,  if  the  British  supremacy  had  here 
continued.  The  prairies  would  have  been  as  productive 
as  now,  the  mines  of  copper  and  silver  and  gold  as  rich 
and  extensive,  the  coal-beds  as  vast,  and  the  cotton-fields 
as  fertile,  if  we  had  been  born  the  subjects  of  the  Georgea 
or  of  Victoria.  Steam  would  have  kept  its  propulsive 
force,  and  sea  and  land  have  been  theaters  of  its  triumph. 
The  river  would  have  been  as  smooth  a  highway  for  the 
commerce  which  seeks  it ;  and  the  leap  of  every  moun 
tain  stream  would  have  given  as  swift  and  constant  a 
push  to  the  wheels  that  set  spindles  and  saws  in  motion. 
Electricity  itself  would  have  lost  no  property,  and 
might  have  become  as  completely  as  now  the  fire- winged 
messenger  of  the  thought  of  mankind. 

But  what  we  have  now,  and  should  not  have  had  ex 
cept  for  that  paper  which  the  Congress  adopted,  is  the 
general  and  increasing  popular  advancement  in  knowl 
edge,  vigor,  as  I  believe  in  moral  culture,  of  which  our 
country  has  been  the  arena,  and  in  which  lies  its  hope  for 
the  future.  The  independence  of  the  nation  has  acted 
with  sympathetic  force  on  the  personal  life  which  the 
nation  includes.  It  has  made  men  more  resolute,  aspir 
ing,  confident,  and  more  susceptible  to  whatever  exalts. 
The  doctrine  that  all  by  creation  are  equal— not  in  re 
spect  of  physical  force  or  of  mental  endowment,  of  means 
for  culture  or  inherited  privilege,  but  in  respect  of  im 
mortal  faculty,  of  duty  to  each  other,  of  right  to  protec 
tion,  and  to  personal  development— this  has  given  manli 
ness  to  the  poor,  enterprise  to  the  weak,  a  kindling  hope 
to  the  most  obscure.  It  has  made  the  individuals  of 
whom  the  nation  is  composed  more  alive  to  the  forces 
which  educate  and  exalt. 

There  has  been  incessant  motive,  too,  for  the  wide  and 
constant  employment  of  these  forces.  It  has  been  felt 
that,  as  the  people  is  sovereign  here,  that  people  must  b? 
tuned  in  mind  and  spirit  for  its  august  and  sovereign 


Else  of  Constitutional  Liberty— Storrs. 


25 


function.  The  establishment  of  common  schools  for  a 
needful  primary  secular  training  has  been  an  instinct  of 
society,  only  recognized  and  repeated  in  provisions  of 
sta  utes.  The  establishment  of  higher  schools,  classical 
and  general,  of  colleges,  scientific  and  professional  semi 
naries,  has  been  as  well  the  impulse  of  the  nation,  and 
the  furtherance  of  them  a  care  of  Government.  The  im 
mense  expansion  of  the  press  in  this  country  has  been 
based  fundamentally  upon  the  same  impulse ;  and  has 
wrought  with  beneficent  general  force  in  the  same  direc 
tion.  Religious  instruction  has  gone  as  widely  as  this 
distribution  of  secular  knowledge. 

It  used  to  be  thought  that  a  Church  dissevered  from 
the  State  must  be  feeble.  Wantine:  wealth  of  endow 
ments  and  dignity  of  titles— its  clergy  entitled  to  no 
place  among  the  Peers,  its  revenues  assured  by  no  legal 
enactments— it  must  remain  obscure  and  poor,  while  the 
absence  of  any  external  limitations,  of  parliamentary 
rubrics  and  a  legal  creed,  must  leave  it  liable  to  endless 
division,  and  tend  to  its  speedy  disintegration  iuto  sects 
and  schisms.  It  seemed  as  hopeless  to  look  for  strength, 
wealth,  beneficence,  for  extensive  educational  and  mis 
sionary  work,  to  such  churches  as  these,  as  to  look  for 
aggressive  military  organization  to  a  company  of  farmers, 
or  for  the  volume  and  thunder  of  Niagara  to  a  thousand 
sinking  and  separate  rills. 

XVI. 

GKOWTH  OF  CHRISTIANITY. 
But  the  work  which  was  given  to  be  done  in  this  coun 
try  was  so  great  and  momentous,  and  has  been  so  constant 
that  matching  itself  against  that  work  the  Church,  under 
whatever  name,  has  realized  a  strength,  and  developed 
an  activity,  wholly  fresh  in  the  world  in  modern  times. 
It  has  not  been  antagonized  by  that  instinct  of  liberty 
which  always  awakens  against  its  work,  where  religion 
is  required  by  law.  It  has  seized  the  opportunity.  Its 
ministers  and  members  have  had  their  own  standards, 
leaders,  laws,  and  sometimes  have  quarreled,  fiercely 
enough,  as  to  which  were  the  better.  But  in  the  work 
which  was  set  them  to  do,  to  give  to  the  sovereign  Ameri 
can  people  the  knowledge  of  God  in  the  Gospel  of  His 
Son,  their  only  strife  has  been  one  of  emulation— to  go 
the  furthest,  to  give  the  most,  and  to  bless  most  largely 
the  land  and  its  future.  The  spiritual  incentive  has  of 
course  been  supreme ;  but  patriotism  has  added  its  im 
pulse  to  the  work.  It  has  been  felt  that  Christianity  is 
the  basis  of  republican  empire,  its  bond  of  cohesion,  its 
life-giving  law ;  that  the  ancient  manuscript  copies  of 
the  Gospels  sent  by  Gregory  to  Augustine  at  Canterbury, 
and  still  preserved  on  sixth  century  parchments  at  Ox 
ford  and  Cambridge— more  than  Magna  Charta  itself 
these  are  the  roots  of  English  liberty ;  that  Magna  Charta 
and  the  Petition  of  Right  with  our  completing  Declara 
tion,  were  possible  only  because  these  had  been  be- 


ity  prevalent  in  the  land,  all  Christian  churches  have 
eagerly  striven.  Their  preachers  have  been  heard  where 
the  pioneer's  fire  scarce  was  kindled.  Their  schools  have 
been  gathered  in  the  temporary  camp,  not  less  than  in 
the  hamlet  or  town.  They  have  sent  their  books  with 
lavish  distribution,  they  have  scattered  their  Bibles  like 
leaves  of  Autumn,  where  settlements  were  hardly  more 
than  prophesied.  In  all  languages  of  the  land  they  have 
told  the  old  story  of  the  Law  and  the  Cross,  a  present  re 
demption  and  a  coming  tribunal.  The  highest  truths, 
most  solemn  and  inspiring,  have  been  the  truths  most 
constantly  in  hand.  It  has  been  felt  that,  in  the  best 
sense,  a  muscular  Christianity  was  indispensable  where 
men  lifted  up  axes  upon  the  thick  trees.  The  delicate 
speculations  of  the  closet  and  the  schools  were  too  dainty 
for  the  work ;  and  the  old  confessions  of  councils  and  re 
formers,  whose  undecaying  and  sovereign  energy  no  use 
exhausts,  have  been  those  always  most  familiar  where 
the  trapper  on  his  stream  or  the  miner  in  his  gulch  has 
found  priest  or  minister  on  his  track. 

Of  course  not  all  the  work  has  been  fruitful.  Not  all 
God's  acorns  come  to  oaks,  but  here  and  there  one.  Not 
all  the  seeds  of  flowers  germinate,  but  enough  to  make 
some  radiant  gardens.  A*hd  out  of  all  this  work  and  gift 
has  come  a  mental  and  moral  training  to  the  nation  at 
large  such  as  it  certain  y  would  not  have  had  except  for 
this  effort,  the  effort  for  which  would  not  have  been  m  tde 
on  a  scale  so  immense  except  for  the  incessant  aim  to  fit 
the  nation  for  its  great  experiment  of  self-regulation. 
The  Declaration  of  Independence  has  been  the  great 
charter  of  public  education;  has  given  impulse  and 
scope  to  this  prodigious  missionary  work. 

The  result  of  the  whole  is  evident  enough.  I  am  not 
here  as  the  eulogist  of  our  people  beyond  what  facts  jus 
tify.  I  admit,  with  regret,  that  American  manners 
sometimes  are  coarse,  and  American  culture  very  imper 
fect  ;  that  the  noblest  examples  of  a  consummate  train 
ing  imply  a  leisure  which  we  have  not  had,  and  are  per 
haps  most  easily  produced  where  social  advantages  are 
more  permanent  than  here,  and  the  law  of  heredity  has  a 
wider  recognition.  We  all  know  too  well  how  much  of 
even  vice  and  shame  there  has  been  in  our  national  life ; 
how  corruption  has  entered  high  places  in  the  Govern 
ment,  and  the  blister  of  its  touch  has  been  upon  laws,  a* 
well  as  on  the  acts  of  prominent  officials.  And  we  know 
the  reckless  greed  and  ambition,  the  fierce  party  spirit, 
the  personal  wrangles  and  jealous  animosities,  with 
which  our  Congress  has  been  often  dishonored;  at  which 
the  nation— sadder  still— has  sometimes  laughed  in  idiotic 
unreason. 

XVII. 
LARGE  VITALITY  AMID  CORRUPTIONS. 

But  knowing  all  this,  and  with  the  impression  of  it  full 
on  our  thoughts,  we  may  exult  in  the  real,  steady,  an4 


fore  them.    And   so   in   the  work  of  keeping  Christian-      prophesying  growth  of  a  better  spirit  toward  dominance 


26 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  187G. 


in  the  land.  I  scout  the  thought  that  we,  as  a  people,  are 
worse  than  our  fathers !  John  Adams,  at  the  head  of  the 
War  Department,  in  1776,  wrote  bitter  laments  of  the 
corruption  which  existed  in  even  that  infant  age  of  the 
Republic,  and  of  the  spirit  of  venality,  rapacious  and  in 
satiable,  which  was  then  the  most  alarming  enemy  of 
America.  He  declared  himself  ashamed  of  the  age  he 
lived  in  !  In  Jefferson's  day  all  Federalists  expected  the 
universal  dominion  of  French  infidelity.  In  Jackson's 
day  all  Whigs  thought  the  country  gone  to  ruin  already, 
as  if  Mr.  Biddle  had  had  the  entire  public  hope  locked  up 
in  the  vaults  of  his  terminated  bank.  In  Folk's  day  the 
excitements  of  the  Mexican  War  gave  life  and  germina 
tion  to  all  seeds  of  rascality.  There  has  never  been  a 
time— not  here  alone,  in  any  country— when  the  fierce 
light  of  incessant  inquiry  blazing  on  men  in  public  life 
would  not  have  brought  out  such  forces  of  evil  as  we 
have  seen,  or  when  the  condemnation  which  followed 
the  discovery  would  have  been  sharper.  And  it  is  among 
my  deepest  convictions  that,  with  all  which  has  hap 
pened  to  debase  and  debauch  it,  the  nation  at  large  was 
never  before  more  mentally  vigorous  or  morally  sound 
than  it  is  to-day. 

Gentlemen,  the  demonstration*  is  around  us.  This  city, 
if  any  place  on  the  continent,  should  have  been  the  one 
where  a  reckless  wickedness  should  have  had  sure  pre 
valence,  and  reforming  virtue  the  least  chance  of  suc- 
ee&s.  Starting  in  1790  with  a  white  population  of  less 
than  30,000— growing  steadily  for  40  years,  till  that 
population  has  multiplied  six-fold—taking  into  itself 
from  that  time  on  such  multitudes  of  emigrants  from  all 
parts  of  the  earth  that  the  dictionaries  of  the  languages 
spoken  in  its  streets  would  make  a  library— all  forms  of 
luxury  coming  with  wealth,  and  all  means  and  facilities 
for  every  vice— the  primary  elections  being  always  the 
seed-bed  out  of  which  springs  its  choice  of  rulers,  with 
the  influence  which  it  sends  to  the  public  councils— its 
citizens  so  absorbed  in  their  pursuits  that  oftentimes, 
for  years  together,  large  numbers  of  them  have  left  its 
affairs  in  hands  the  most  of  all  unsuited  to  so  supreme 
and  delicate  a  trust— it  might  well  have  been  expected 
that  while  its  docks  were  echoing  with  a  commerce  which 
encompassed  the  globe,  while  its  streets  were  thronged 
with  the  eminent  and  the  gay  from  all  parts  of  the  land, 
while  its  homes  had  in  them  uncounted  thousands  of 
toble  men  and  cultured  women,  while  its  stately 
(squares  swept  out  year  by  year  across  new  space,  while 
it  founded  great  institutions  of  beneficence  and  shot  new 
spires  upward  toward  heaven,  and  turned  the  rocky 
waste  to  a  pleasure-ground  famous  in  the  earth,  its  Gov 
ernment  would  decay,  and  its  recklessness  of  moral  ideas, 
if  not  as  well  of  political  principles,  would  be-some  ap 
parent. 

Men  have  prophesied  this,  from  the  outset  till  now. 
The  fear  of  it  began  with  the  first  great  advance  of  the 
wealth,  population,  and  fame  of  the  city ;  and  there,  have 


not  been  wanting  facts  in  its  history  which  served  to  re 
new  if  not  to  justify  the  fear. 

But  when  the  war  of  1861  broke  on  the  land,  and  shad 
owed  every  home  within  it,  this  city— which  had  voted 
by  immense  majorities  against  the  existing  Administra 
tion,  and  which  was  liaked  by  a  million  ties  with  the 
great  communities  that  were  rushing  to  assail  it— flung 
out  its  banners  from  window  and  spire,  from  City  Hall 
and  newspaper  office,  and  poured  its  wealth  and  life  into- 
the  service  of  sustaining  the  Government,  with  a  swift 
ness  and  strength  and  a  vehement  energy  that  were 
never  surpassed.  When,  afterward,  greedy  and  treach 
erous  men,  capable  and  shrewd,  deceiving  the  unwary, 
hiring  the  skillful,  and  molding  the  very  law  to  their 
uses,  had  concentrated  in  their  hands  the  government  of 
the  city,  and  had  bound  it  in  seemingly  invincible  chains 
while  they  plundered  its  treasury— it  rose  upon  them, 
when  advised  of  the  facts,  as  Samson  rose  upon  the  Phil 
istines  ;  and  the  two  new  cords  that  were  upon  his  hands 
no  more  suddenly  became  as  flax  that  was  burned  than 
did  those  manacles  imposed  upon  the  city  by  the  craft 
of  the  Ring. 

Its  leaders  of  opinion  to-day  are  the  men— like  him  who 
presides  m  our  assembly— whom  virtue  exalts  and  char 
acter  crowns.  It  rejoices  in  a  Chief  Magistrate  as  up 
right  and  intrepid  in  a  virtuous  course  as  any  of  thosev 
whom  he  succeeds.  It  is  part  of  a  State  whose  present 
position,  in  laws,  and  officers,  and  the  spirit  of  its  people 
does  no  discredit  to  the  noblest  of  its  memories.  And 
from  these  hights  between  the  rivers,  looking  over  the 
land,  looking  out  on  the  earth  to  which  its  daily  embas 
sies  go,  it  sees  nowhere  beneath  the  sun  a  city  more  am 
ple  in  its  moral  securities,  a  city  more  dear  to  those 
possess  It,  a  city  more  splendid  in  promise  and  in  hope. 

What  is  true  of  the  city  is  tnie,  in  effect,  of  all  the  land. 
Two  things,  at  least,  have  been  established  by  our  na* 
tional  history,  the  impression  of  which  the  world  will 
not  lose.  The  one  is,  that  institutions  like  ours,  when 
sustained  by  a  prevalent  moral  life  throughout  the  na 
tion,  are  naturally  permanent.  The  other  is,  that  they 
tend  to  peaceful  relations  with  other  States.  They  do 
this  in  fulfillment  of  an  organic  tendency,  and  not 
through  any  accident  of  location.  The  same  tendency 
will  inhere  in  them,  whosoever  established. 

XVIII. 

DISINTEGRATION  IN  EUROPE. 
In  this  age  of  the  world,  and  in  all  the  States  which: 
Christianity  quickens,  the  allowance  of  free  movement 
to  the  popular  miud  is  essential  to  the  stability  of  public 
institutions.  There  iray  be  restraint  enough  to  guide 
and  keep  each  movement  from  premature  exhibition. 
But  there  cannot  be  force  enough  used  to  resist  it,  and 
to  reverse  its  gathering  current.  If  there  is,  the  Gov 
ernment  is  swiftly  overthrown,  as  in  France  so  often,  or 
is  left  on  one  side,  as  Austria  has  been  by  the  advancing 


Rise  of  Constitutional  Liberty— Storrs. 


27 


German  people;  like  the  Castle  of  Heidelberg,  at  once 
palace  and  fortress,  high-placed  and  superb,  but  only  the 
stateliest  ruin  in  Europe,  when  the  rail  train  thunde-s 
through  the  tunnel  beneath  it,  and  the  Neckar  sings 
along  its  near  channel  as  if  tower  and  tournament  never 
had  been.  Revolution,  transformation,  organic  change, 
have  thus  all  the  time  for  this  hundred  years  been  pro 
ceeding  in  Europe ;  sometimes  silent,  but  oftener  amid 
thunders  of  stricken  fields;  sometimes  pacific,  but 
oftener  with  garments  rolled  in  blood. 

In  England  the  progress  has  been  peaceful,  the  popular 
demands  being  ratified  by  law  whenever  the  need  became 
apparent.  It  has  been  vast  as  well  as  peaceful  in  the  ex 
tension  of  suffrage,  in  the  ever-increasing  power  of  the 
Commons,  in  popular  education.  Chatham  himself  would 
hardly  know  his  own  England  if  he  should  return  to  it. 
The  throne  continues,  illustrated  by  the  virtues  of  her 
who  fills  it,  and  the  ancient  forms  still  obtain  in  Parlia 
ment.  But  it  could  not  have  occurred  to  him  or  to  Burke 
that  a  century  after  the  ministry  of  Grenville  the  em 
barkation  of  tbe  Pilgrims  would  be  one  of  the  prominent 
historical  pictures  on  the  panels  of  the  lobby  of  the 
House  of  Lords,  or  that  the  name  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  and 
of  Bradshaw,  President  of  the  High  Court  of  Justice, 
would  be  cut  in  the  stone  in  Westminster  Abbey,  over  the 
places  in  which  they  were  buried,  and  whence  their  de 
caying  bodies  were  dragged  to  the  ditch  and  the  gibbet. 
England  is  now,  as  has  been  well  said,  "  an  aristocratic 
Republic,  with  a  permanent  executive."  Its  only  perils 
lie  in  the  fact  of  that  aristocracy,  which,  however,  is 
flexible  enough  to  endure,  of  that  permanence  in  the  Ex 
ecutive  which  would  hardly  outlive  one  vicious  prince. 

What  changes  have  taken  place  in  France  I  need  not 
remind  you,  nor  how  uncertain  is  still  its  future.  You 
know  how  the  swift,  untiring  wheels  of  advance  or  re 
action  have  rolled  this  way  and  that  in  Italy  and  in 
Spain;  how  Germany  has  had  to  be  reconstructed;  how 
Hungary  has  had  to  fight  and  suffer  for  that  just  place 
in  the  Austrian  councils  which  only  imperial  defeat  sur 
rendered.  You  know  how  precarious  the  equilibrium 
now  is  in  many  States  between  popular  right?  and 
princely  prerogative  ;  what  armies  are  maintained  to 
fortify  governments ;  what  fear  of  sudden  and  violent 
change,  like  an  avalanche  tumbling  at  the  touch  of  a  foot, 
perplexes  nations.  Th<*  records  of  change  make  the  his 
tory  of  Europe.  The  expectation  of  change  is  almost  as 
wide  as  the  continent  itself. 

Meantime,  how  permanent  has  been  the  Republic, 
which  seemed  at  the  outset  to  foreign  spectators  a  mere 
tudden  insurrection,  a  mere  organized  riot !  Its  organic 
law,  adopted  after  exciting  debate,  but  arousing  no  bat 
tle,  and  enforced  by  no  army,  has  been  interpreted  and 
peacefully  administered,  with  one  great  exception,  from 
the  beginning.  It  has  once  been  assailed  with  passion 
and  skill,  with  splendid  daring  and  unbounded  self-sacri- 
gce,  by  thoee  who  sought  a  sectional  advantage  through 


its  destruction.  No  monarchy  of  the  world  could  have 
stood  that  assault.  It  seemed  as  if  the  last  fatal  Apoca 
lypse  had  come,  to  drench  the  land  with  plague  and  flood, 
and  wrap  it  in  a  fiery  gloom.  The  Republic 

pouring,  like  tke  tide  into  a  breach, 

With  ample  aud  brim  fullness  of  it3  force, 

subdued  the  Rebellion,  restored  the  dominion  of  the  old 
Constitution,  amended  its  provisions  in  the  contrary 
direction  from  that  which  had  been  so  fiercely  sought, 
gave  it  guarantees  of  endurance  while  the  continent; 
lasts,  and  made  its  ensigns  more  eminent  than  ever  m 
the  regions  from  which  they  had  been  expelled.  Ther 
very  portions  of  the  people  which  then  sought  its  over 
throw  are  now  again  its  applauding  adherents— the  great 
and  constant  reconciling  force,  the  tranquillizing  ire- 
narch,  being  the  freedom  which  it  leaves  in  their  hands.. 

XIX. 
CONSERVATIVE    FORCES. 

It  has  kept  its  place,  this  Republic  of  ours,  in  spite  of 
the  rapid  expansion  of  the  nation  over  territory  so  wide 
that  the  scanty  strip  of  the  original  State  is  only  as  a 
fringe  on  its  immense  mantle.  It  has  kept  its  place, 
while  vehement  debates,  involving  the  profoundest  eth 
ical  principles,  have  stirred  to  its  depths  the  whole  pub 
lic  mind.  It  has  kept  its  place,  while  the  tribes  of  man 
kind  have  been  pouring  upon  it,  seeking  the  shelter  and 
freedom  which  it  gave.  It  saw  an  illustrious  President; 
murdered  by  the  bullet  of  an  assassin.  It  saw  his  place 
occupied  as  quietly  by  another  as  if  nothing  unforeseen 
or  alarming  had  occurred.  It  saw  prodigious  armies  as 
sembled  for  its  defense.  It  saw  those  armies  at  the  end 
of  the  war  marching  in  swift  and  long  procession  up  the 
streets  of  the  capital,  and  then  dispersing  into  their  for 
mer  peaceful  citizenship,  as  if  they  had  had  no  arms  inr 
their  hands.  The  General  before  whose  skill  and  will 
those  armies  bad  been  shot  upon  the  forces  which  op 
posed  them,  aud  whose  word  had  been  their  military  law, 
remained  for  three  years  an  appointed  officer  of  the  Gov 
ernment  he  had  saved.  Elected  then  to  be  the  head  of 
that  Government,  and  again  reelected  by  the  bal 
lots  of  his  countrymen,  in  a  few  mouths  more  he  will 
have  retired,  to  be  thenceforth  a  citizen  like  the  rest,  eli 
gible  to  office,  and  entitled  to  vote,  but  with  no  thought 
of  any  prerogative  descending  to  him  or  to  his  children 
from  his  great  service  and  military  fame.  The  Republic, 
whose  triumphing  armies  he  led,  will  remember  his 
name  and  be  grateful  for  his  work;  but  neither  to  him 
nor  to  any  one  else  will  it  ever  give  sovereignty  over 
itself. 

From  the  lakes  to  the  Gulf  its  will  is  the  law,  its  do 
minion  complete.  Its  centripetal  and  centrifugal  force* 
are  balanced,  almost  as  in  the  astronomy  of  the  heavens. 
Decentralizing  authority,  it  puts  his  own  part  of  it  into 
the  hand  of  every  citizen.  Giving  free  scope  to  private 
enterprise,  allowing  not  only  but  accepting  and  encour- 


28 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  187G. 


aging  eacli  movement  of  the  public  reason  winch  is  its 
only  terrestrial  rule,  there  is  no  threat,  in  all  its  sky,  of 
division  or  downfall.  It  cannot  be  successfully  assailed 
from  without,  with  a  blow  at  its  life,  while  other  na 
tions  continue  sane. 

It  has  been  sometimes  compared  to  a  pyramid,  broad- 
based  and  secure,  not  liable  to  overthrow,  as  is  obelisk 
or  column,  by  storm  or  age.  The  comparison  is  just,  but 
it  is  not  sufficient.  It  should  rather  be  compared  to  one 
of  the  permanent  features  of  nature,  and  not  to  any  arti 
ficial  construction— to  the  river,  which  flows  like  our  own 
Hudson,  along  the  courses  that  nature  opens,  forever  in 
motion,  but  forever  the  same ;  to  the  lake,  which  Les  on 
common  days  level  and  bright  in  placid  stillness,  while  it 
gathers  its  fullness  from  many  lands  and  lifts  its  waves 
in  stormy  strength  when  winds  assail  it ;  to  the  mountain, 
which  is  not  artistically  shaped,  and  which  only  rarely, 
in  some  supreme  sunburst,  flushes  with  color,  but  whose 
roots  the  very  earthquake  cannot  shake,  and  on  whose 
brow  the  storms  fall  hurtless,  while  under  its  shelter  the 
cottage  nestles,  and  up  its  sides  the  gardens  climb. 

So  stands  the  Republic: 

Whole  as  the  marble,  founded  as  the  rock, 
As  bi  oad  and  general  as  the  casing  air. 

What  has  been  the  fact  ?  Lay  out  of  sight  tbat  late  evil 
war  which  could  not  be  averted  when  once  it  had  been 
threatened,  except  by  the  sacrifice  of  the  Government 
itself  and  a  wholly  unparalleled  public  suicide,  and  how 
much  of  war  with  foreign  powers  has  the  century  seen  ? 
There  has  been  a  frequent  crackle  of  musketry  along  the 
frontiers,  as  Indian  tribes  which  refused  to  be  civilized 
have  slowly  and  fiercely  retreated  toward  the  West. 
There  was  one  war  declared  against  Tripoli,  in  1801, 
when  the  Republic  took  by  the  throat  the  African  pirates 
to  whom  Europe  paid  tribute,  and  when  the  gallantry  of 
Preble  and  Decatur  gave  early  distinction  to  our  Navy. 
There  was  a  war  declared  against  England,  in  1812, 
when  our  seamen  had  been  taken  from  under  our  flag, 
from  the  decks,  iudeed,  of  our  national  ships,  and  our 
commerce  had  been  practically  swept  from  the  seas. 
There  was  a  war  affirmed  already  to  exist  in  Mexico  in 
1846,  entered  into  by  surprise,  never  formally  declared, 
against  which  the  moral  sentiment  of  the  nation  rose 
widely  in  revolt,  but  which  in  its  result  added  largely  to 
our  territory,  oi>ened  to  us  Calif ornian  treasures,  and 
wrote  the  names  of  Buena  Vista  and  Monterey  on  our 
short  annals. 

XXI. 
FEACE  WITH  THE  WORLD. 

That  has  been  our  military  history ;  and  if  a  people,  as 
powerful  and  as  proud,  has  anywhere  been  more  peace 
able  also  in  the  last  100  years,  the  strictest  research  fails 
4o  find  it.  Smarting  with  the  injury  done  us  by  England 
during  the  crisis  of  our  National  peril,  in  spite  of  the  re- 


who  should  have  been  your  orator  to-day;  while  hostile 
taunts  had  incensed  our  people ;  while  burning  ships  Lad 
exasperated  commerce,  and  while  what  looked  like  artful 
evasions  had  made  statesmen  indignant— with  a  half 
million  men  who  hardly  yet  laid  down  their  arms,  with  a 
navy  never  before  so  vast  or  so  fitted  for  service— when  a 
war  with  England  would  have  had  the  force  of  passion 
behind  it,  and  would,  at  any  rate,  have  shown  to  the 
world  that  the  nation  respects  its  starry  flag  and  means 
to  have  it  secure  on  the  seas— we  referred  all  differences 
to  arbitration,  appointed  commissioners,  tried  the  cause 
at  Geneva  with  advocates,  not  with  armies,  and  got  a 
prompt  and  ample  verdict.  If  Canada  now  lay  next  to 
Yorkville,  it  would  not  be  safer  from  armed  incursion 
than  it  is  when  divided  by  only  a  Custom-house  from  all 
the  strength  of  this  Republic. 

The  fact  is  apparent,  and  the  reason  not  less  so.  A 
monarchy,  just  as  it  is  despotic,  finds  incitement  to  war 
—for  preoccupation  of  the  popular  mind;  to  gratify 
nobles,  officers,  the  army;  for  historic  renown.  An  in 
telligent  republic  hates  war,  and  shuns  it.  It  counts 
standing  armies  a  curse  only  second  to  an  annual  pesti 
lence.  It  wants  no  glory,  but  from  growth.  It  delights 
itself  in  arts  of  peace,  seeks  social  enjoyment  and  in 
crease  of  possessions,  and  feels  instinctively  that,  like 
Israel  of  old,  "its  strength  is  to  sit  still."  It 
cannot  bear  to  miss  the  husbandman  from  the 
fields,  the  citizen  from  the  town,  the  house 
father  from  the  home,  the  worshiper  from  the 
church.  To  change  or  shape  other  people's  institutions 
is  no  part  of  its  business.  To  force  them  to  accept  its 
forms  of  government  would  simply  contradict  and  nullify 
its  charter.  Except,  then,  when  it  is  startled  into  pas 
sion,  by  the  cry  of  a  suffering  under  oppression  which 
irtirs  its  pulses  into  tumult,  or  when  it  is  assailed  in  its 
own  rights,  citizens,  property,  it  will  not  go  to  war,  nor 
even  then  if  diplomacy  can  find  a  remedy  for  the  wrong. 
"  Millions  for  defense,"  said  Cotesworth  Pluckney  to  -the 
French  Directory,  when  Talleyrand  in  their  name  had 
threatened  him  with  war,  "but  not  a  cent  for  tribute." 
He  might  have  added,  "  and  not  a  dollar  for  aggressive 
strife," 

It  will  never  be  safe  to  insult  such  a  nation,  or  to  op 
press  its  citizens,  for  the  reddest  blood  is  in  its  veins,  and 
some  Capt.  Ingraham  may  always  appear  to  lay  hia  little 
sloop-of-war  alongside  the  offending  frigate,  with  shotted 
guns  and  a  peremptory  summons.  There  is  a  way  to 
make  powder  inexplosive  ;  but,  treat  it  chemically  how 
you  will,  the  dynamite  will  not  stand  many  blows  of  the 
hammer.  The  detonating  tendency  is  too  permanent  in 
it.  But  if  left  to  itself,  such  a  people  will  be  peaceful,  as 
ours  has  been.  It  will  foster  peace  among  the  nations. 
It  will  tend  to  dissolve  great  permanent  armaments,  as 
the  light  conquers  ice,  and  Summer  sunshine  breaks  the 
glacier  which  a  hundred  trip-hammers  could  only  scar. 


anonstnauces  presented  through  that  distinguished  citizen  |  The  longer  it  continues,  the  more  widely  and  effectively 


Else  of  Constitutional  Liberty— Sto^rs. 


its  influence  spreads,  the  more  will  its  benign  example 
hasten  the  day,  so  long  foretold,  so  surely  coming,  when 

The  war-drum  throbs  no  longer,  and  the  battle-flairs  are  furled 
In  the  Parliament  of  man.  the  Federation  of  the  world. 

XXII. 
DUTIES  TOWARD  THE  FUTURE. 

It  will  not  be  forgotten,  in  the  land  or  in  the  earth, 
until  the  stars  have  fallen  from  their  poise,  or  until  our 
vivid  morning  star  of  republican  liberty,  not  losing  its 
luster,  has  seen  its  special  brightness  fade  in  the  ampler 
effulgence  of  a  freedom  universal  I 

But  while  we  rejoice  in  that  which  is  past,  and  gladly 
recognize  the  vast  organic  mystery  of  life  which  was  in 
the  Declaration,  the  plans  of  Providence  which  slowly 
and  silently,  but  with  ceaseless  progression,  had  led  the 
way  to  it,  the  immense  and  enduring  results  of  good 
which  from  it  have  flown,  let  us  not  forget  the  duty 
which  always  equals  privilege,  aud  that  of  peoples,  as 
well  as  of  persons,  to  whomsoever  much  is  given  shall 
only  therefore  the  more  be  required.  Let  us  consecrate 
ourselves,  each  one  of  us,  here,  to  the  further  duties 
which  wait  to  be  fulfilled,  to  the  work  which  shall  con 
summate  the  great  work  of  the  fathers  ! 

Mr.  President,  fellow-citizens,  to  an  extent  too  great 
for  your  patience,  but  with  a  rapid  incompleteness  that 
is  only  too  evident  as  we  match  it  with  the  theme,  I  have 
outlined  before  you  a  few  of  the  reasons  why  we  have  the 
right  to  commemorate  the  day  whose  hundredth  an 
niversary  has  brought  us  together,  and  why  the  paper 
then  adopted  has  interest  and  importance  not  only  for  us, 
but  for  all  the  advancing  sons  of  men.  Thank  God  that 
he  who  framed  the  Declaration,  and  he  who  was  its  fore 
most  champion,  both  lived  to  see  the  nation  they  had 
shaped  growing  to  greatness,  and  to  die  together,  in  that 
marvelous  coincidence,  on  its  semi-centennial !  The 
h'fty  years  which  have  passed  since  then  have  only  still 
further  honored  their  work.  Mr.  Adams  was  mistaken  in 
the  day  which  he  named  as  the  one  to  be  most  fondly 
remembered.  It  was  not  that  on  which  independence  of 
the  Empire  of  Great  Britain  was  formally  resolved.  It 
was  that  on  which  the  reasons  were  given  which  justified 
the  act,  and  the  principles  were  announced  which  made 
it  of  general  significance  to  mankind.  But  he  would 
have  been  absolutely  right  in  sayiug  of  the  fourth  day 
what  he  did  say  of  the  second :  it  "  will  be  the  jaost  re- 
niarkable  epoch  in  the  history  of  America  :  to  be  celebra 
ted  by  succeeding  generations  as  the  great  anniversary 
festival,  commemorated  as  the  day  of  deliverance,  by 
solemn  acts  of  devotion  to  Almighty  God,  from  one  end 
of  the  continent  to  the  other." 

From  barren  soils  come  richest  grapes,  and  on  severe 
and  rocky  slopes  the  trees  are  often  of  toughest  fiber.  The 
wines  of  Riidesheiin  and  Johannisberg  cannot  be  grown 
In  the  fatness  of  the  gardens,  and  the  cedars  of  Lebanon 
disdain  the  levels  of  marsh  and  meadow.  So  a  heroism 


is  sometimes  native  to  penury  which  luxury  enervates, 
and  the  great  resolution  which  sprang  up  in  the  blast 
and  blossomed  under  inclement  skies,  may  lose  its 
shapely  and  steadfast  strength  when  the  air  is  all  of 
Summer  softness.  In  exuberant  resources  is  to  be  the 
coming  American  peril— in  a  swiftly-increasing  luxury  of 
life.  The  old  humility,  hardihood,  patience,  are  too  likely 
to  be  lost  when  material  success  again  opens,  as  it  will, 
all  avenues  to  wealth,  and  when  its  brilliant  prizes  solicit, 
as  again  they  will,  the  national  spirit. 

Be  it  ours  to  endeavor  that  that  temper  of  the  fathers 
which  was  nobler  than  their  work  shall  live  in  the  chil 
dren,  and  exalt  to  its  tone  their  coming  career ;  that 
political  intelligence,  patriotic  devotion,  a  reverent  spirit 
toward  Him  who  is  above,  an  exulting  expectation  of 
the  future  of  the  world,  and  a  sense  of  our  relation  to 
it,  shall  be  as  of  old,  essential  forces  in  our  public  life, 
that  education  aud  religion  shall  keep  step  all  the  time 
with  the  nation's  advance,  and  be  forever  instantly  at 
home  wherever  its  Hag  shakes  out  its  folds. 

XXXIII. 

PRIVILEGES  THAT  INSPIRE  AMERICANS. 

Be  it  ours  to  endeavor  that  that  temper  of  the  fathers 
which  was  nobler  than  their  work  shall  live  in  the  chil 
dren,  and  exalt  to  its  tone  their  coming  career;  that 
political  intelligence, patriotic  devotion,  a  reverent  spirit 
toward  Him  who  is  above,  an  exulting  expectation  of  the 
future  of  the  world,  and  a  sense  of  our  relation  to  it, 
shall  be,  as  of  old,  essential  forces  in  our  public  life, 
that  education  and  religion  shall  keep  step  all  the  time 
with  the  nation's  advance,  and  be  forever  instantly  at 
home  wherever  its  flag  shakes  out  its  folds. 

In  a  spirit  worthy  of  the  memories  of  the  past  let  us  set 
ourselves  to  accomplish  the  tasks  which  in  the  sphere  of 
national  politics  still  await  completion.  We  burn  the 
sunshine  of  other  years  when  we  ignite  the  wood  or  coal 
upon  our  hearths.  We  enter 'a  privilege  which  ages 
have  secured  in  our  daily  enjoyment  of  political 
freedom.  While  the  kindling  glow  irradiates  our  homes, 
let  it  shed  its  luster  on  our  spirit  and  quicken  it  for  its 
further  work.  Let  us  fight  against  the  tendency  of  edu 
cated  men  to  reserve  themselves  from  politics,  remember 
ing  that  no  other  form  of  activity  is  so  grand  or  effective 
as  that  which  affects,  first  the  character,  and  then  the 
revelation  of  character  in  the  government,  of  a  great  and 
free  people.  Let  us  make  religious  dissensions  here,  as  a 
force  in  politics,  as  absurd  as  witchcraft.  Let  party 
names  be  nothing  to  us,  in  comparison  with  that  costly 
and  proud  inheritance  of  liberty  and  of  law  which  par 
ties  exist  to  conserve  and  enlarge,  which  any  party  will 
have  here  to  maintain  if  it  would  not  be  buried 
at  the  next  cross-roads,  with  a  stake  through  its  breast. 
Let  us  seek  the  unity  of  all  sections  of  the  Republic 
through  the  prevalence  in  all  of  mutual  respect,  through 
the  assurance  in  all  of  local  freedom,  through  the 


30 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


mastery  in  all  of  that  supreme  spirit  which  flashed  from 
the  lips  of  Patrick  Henry  when  he  said,  in  the  first 
Continental  Congress,  "I  am  not  a  Virginian,  but  an 
.American."  Let  us  take  care  that  labor  maintains  its 
ancient  place  of  privilege  and  honor,  and  that  industry 
lias  no  fetters  imposed  of  legal  restraint  or  of 
social  discredit  to  hinder  its  work  or  to  lessen 
its  wage.  Let  us  turn  and  overturn  in  public  dis 
cussion,  in  political  change,  till  we  secure  a  civil  service, 
honorable,  intelligent,  and  worthy  of  the  land,  in  which 
capable  integrity,  not  partisan  zeal,  shall  be  the  con 
dition  of  each  public  trust ;  and  let  us  resolve  that  what 
ever  it  may  cost,  of  labor  and  of  patience,  of  sharper 
economy  and  of  general  sacrifice,  it  shall  come  to  pass 
that  wherever  American  labor  toils,  wherever  American 
enterprise  plans,  wherever  American  commei'ce  reaches, 
thither  again  shall  go  as  of  old  the  country's  coin— the 
Amefican  eagle,  with  the  encircling  stars  and  golden 
plumes! 

In  a  word,  fellow-citizens,  let  each  of  us  live  in  the 
blessing  and  the  duty  of  our  great  citizenship,  as  those 
who  are  conscious  of  unreckoned  indebtedness  to  a  he 
roic  and  prescient  past,  the  grand  and  solemn  lineage  of 
whose  freedom  runs  back  beyond  Bunker  Hill  or  the 
Mayflower,  runs  back  beyond  muniments  and  memories 


of  men,  and  has  the  majesty  of  far  centuries  upon  it! 
.Let  us  live  as  those  for  whom  God  hid  a  continent  from 
the  world  till  He  could  open  all  its  scope  to  the  freedom 
and  faith  of  gathered  peoples,  from  many  lauds,  to  be  a 
nation  to  His  honor  and  praise!  Let  us  live  as  those  to 
whom  He  commits  the  magnificent  trust  of  blessing  peo 
ples  many  and  far,  by  the  truths  which  he  has  made  our 
life,  and  by  the  history  which  He  helps  us  to  accomplish. 
Let  us  not  be  unmindful  of  this  ultimate  and  inspiring 
lesson  of  the  hour.  By  all  the  memories  of  the  past,  by 
all  the  impulses  of  the  present,  by  the  noblest  instincts 
of  our  own  souls,  by  the  touch  of  His  sovereign  spirit 
upon  us,  God  make  us  faithful  to  the  work  and  to  Him  ! 
that  so  not  only  this  city  may  abide  in  long  and  bright 
tranquillity  of  peace,  when  our  eyes  have  shut  forever  on 
street  and  spire,  and  populous  square :  that  so  the  land,  in 
all  its  future,  may  reflect  an  influence  from  this  anniver 
sary  ;  and  that,  when  another  century  has  passed,  the 
sun  which  then  ascends  the  heavens  may  look  on  a  world 
advanced  and  illumined  beyond  our  thought,  and  here 
may  behold  the  same  great  nation,  born  of  struggle,  bap 
tized  into  liberty,  and  in  its  second  terrific  trial  purchased 
by  blood,  then  expanded  and  multiplied  till  all  the  land 
blooms  at  its  touch,  and  still  one  in  its  life,  because  still 
pacific,  Christian,  free  ! 


THE     PROGRESS     OF     LIBERTY. 

THE     HON.     CHARLES     FRANCIS     ADAMS     AT     TAUNTON,    MASS. 


I. 

T  salute  yon,  my  fellow  countrymen,  with  a 
cheer  of  welcome  on  this  joyous  day,  when  forty  millions 
of  human  voices  rise  up  with  one  accord  to  heaven,  in 
grateful  benisons  for  the  mercy  showered  on  three  suc 
cessive  generations  of  the  race,  by  the  Great  Disposer  of 
events,  during  the  hundred  years  that  have  passed  away. 
Yet  far  be  it  from  us  to  glory  in  this  anniversary  festival 
with  any  spirit  of  ostentation,  as  if  assuming  to  be  the 
very  elect  of  God's  creatures.  Let  us  rather  join  m  hum 
ble  but  earnest  supplication  for  the  continuance  of  that 
support  from  aloft  by  reason  of  which  a  small  and  weak 
and  scattered  band  have  been  permitted  so  to  grow  in 
strength  as  to  command  a  recognized  position  among  the 
leading  powers  of  the  earth. 

Less  than  three  centuries  since,  the  European  explorer 
first  set  his  foot  on  these  northern  shores,  with  a  view  to 
occupation.  He  found  a  primitive  race  aspiring  scarcely 
higher  than  to  the  common  enjoyments  of  animal  exist 
ence,  and  slow  to  respond  to  any  nobler  call.  How  long 
they  had  continued  in  the  same  condition  there  was  little 
evidence  to  determine.  But  enough  has  been  since  gath 
ered  tojusiify  the  belief  that  advance  never  can  be  one 


of  their  attributes.  Without  forecast,  and  insensible  to 
ambition,  after  long  experience  and  earnest  effort  to  ele 
vate  them,  the  experiment  of  civilization  must  be  admit 
ted  to  have  failed.  The  North  American  Indian  never 
could  have  improved  the  state  he  was  in  when  he  was 
first  found  here.  He  must  be  regarded  merely  as  the 
symbol  of  continuous  negation,  of  the  everlasting  rota 
tion  of  the  present,  not  profiting  by  the  experience  of 
the  past,  and  feebly  sensible  of  the  possibilities  of  the 
future. 

The  Europeans  at  last  came  in  upon  him,  and  the  scene 
began  at  once  to  change.  The  magnificence  of  nature 
presented  to  his  view,  to  which  the  native  had  been  blind, 
at  once  stimulated  his  passion  to  develop  its  advantages 
for  civilization,  and  ere  long  the  wilderness  began  to 
blossom  like  a  rose.  The  hum  of  industry  was  heard  to 
echo  in  every  valley,  and  it  ascended  every  mountain. 
A  new  people  had  appeared,  animated  by  a  spirit  which 
enlisted  labor  without  stint  and  directed  it  to  the  channels 
of  improvement.  With  their  eyes  steadily  fixed  upon  the 
future,  and  their  sturdy  sinews  braced  to  the  immediate 
task,  there  is  no  cause  for  wonder  that  the  sparse  but 
earnest  adventurers  who  first  set  foot  on  the  soil  of  the 


The  Progress  of  Liberty — Adams. 


31 


new  continent  should  have,  in  the  steady  progress  of 
time,  made  good  the  aspiration  with  which  they  began, 
•of  founding  a  future  happy  home  for  ever  increasinar  mil 
lions  of  their  race.  Between  these  two  forces,  the 
American  Indian,  who  dwells  only  in  the  present,  and 
the  European  adventurer,  who  fixes  his  gaze  so  steadily 
on  the  future,  the  issue  of  a  struggle  could  end  only  in 
one  way.  While  the  one  goes  on  dwindling  even  to  the 
prospect  of  ultimate  extinction,  the  other  spreads  peace 
and  happiness  among  numbers  increasing  over  the  con 
tinent  with  a  rapidity  seldom  exceeded  in  the  rec  jrds  of 
civilization. 

But  here  it  seems  as  if  I  catch  a  sound  of  rebuke  from 
far  off  in  another  quarter  of  the  globe.  "  Come  now," 
says  the  denizen  of  ancient  Africa,  "  this  assurance  on 
the  part  of  a  new  people  like  you  is  altogether  intolera 
ble.  You  of  a  race  starting  only,  as  if  yesterday,  with 
your  infant  civilization,  what  nonsense  to  pride  yourself 
on  your  petty  labors,  when  you  have  not  an  idea  of  the 
magnitude  of  the  works  and  the  magnificence  of  the  re 
sults  obtained  from  them  in  our  fertile  regions  by  a  popu 
lation  civilized  loug  and  long  and  long  before  you  and 
your  boasting  new  continent  were  ever  even  dreamed  of 
in  the  progress  of  mankind.  Just  come  over  here  to  the 
land  of  Egypt,  flowing  with  milk  and  honey.  Cast  a 
glance  at  our  temples  and  pyramids,  at  our  lakes  and 
rivers,  and  even  our  tombs,  erected  so  long  since  that 
nobody  can  tell  when.  Observe  the  masterly  skill  dis 
played  in  securing  durability,  calling  for  a  corresponding 
contribution  of  skilled  labor  from  myriads  of  workmen 
to  complete  them.  Consider  further  that  even  that  holy 
V'ook,  which  you  yourselves  esteem  as  embodying  the 
highest  conceptions  of  the  Deity,  and  lessons  of  morals 
continually  taught  among  you  to  this  day,  had  its  origin 
substantially  from  here.  Remember  that  ail  this  hap 
pened  before  the  development  of  the  boasted  Greek  aud 
Roman  cultivation,  and  be  modest  with  your  pretensions 
for  your  laud  of  yesterday,  of  any  peculiar  merit  for 
your  aspirations  to  advance  your  condition." 

II. 

PAST  AND  PRESENT. 

To  all  of  which  interjection  of  my  African  prompter  I 
make  but  a  short  reply.  By  his  own  showing  he  appeals 
only  to  what  was  ages  a«o,  and  not  to  what  now  is. 
What  are  the  imperishable  monuments  constructed  so 
long  ago  but  memorials  of  an  obsolete  antiquity,  to  be 
gazed  at  by  the  wandering  traveler  as  examples  never  to 
be  copied.  If  once  devoted  to  special  forms  of  Divine 
worship,  the  faith  that  animated  the  structures  has  not 
simply  lost  its  vitality  but  has  been,  buried  in  oblivion 
forever.  What  are  the  catacombs  but  futile  efforts  to 
perpetuate  mere  matter  after  the  living  principle  has 
vanished  away?  Why  not  apply  them  to  advance  the 
condition  of  the  survivors  ?  How  about  the  sacred  book 
to  which  you  refer?  Does  it  not  record  an  account  of  an 


emigration  of  au  industrious  and  conscientious  people 
compelled  to  retreat  by  reason  of  the  recklessness  of  an 
ignorant  ruler  1  And  bow  has  it  been  ever  since  1  Al 
though  conceded  to  be  by  nature  one  of  the  most  favored 
regions  of  the  earth,  the  general  tendency  has  been  *ir 
from  indicating  a  corresponding:  degree  of  prosperity. 
Even  the  splendid  memorials  of  long  past  ages  testify  by 
the  solitudes  around  them  only  to  the  vanity  of  indulging 
idle  aspirations.  The  conclusion  then  to  be  drawn  from 
this  spectacle  is  not  of  life  but  of  3eath,  not  of  hope  but  of 
despair. 

So,  I  have  presented  to  you  in  this  picture  the  three 
types  of  humanity  as  exemplified  in  the  social  systems  of 
the  world. 

Whilst  the  African  represents  the  past,  and  the  Indian 
clings  only  to  the  present,  it  is  left  to  the  European  and 
his  congener  in  America  persistently  to  follow  in  the  fu 
ture  the  object  of  the  advancement  of  mankind. 

1.  The  retrograde.  2.  The  stationary.  3.  The  advance. 
Wrhich  is  it  to  be  with  us  1 

We  can  only  judge  of  the  future  by  what  it  has  been  in 
the  past.  Is  there  or  is  there  not  a  peculiar  element,  not 
found  in  either  of  the  other  races,  which  has  shown  so 
much  vigor  in  the  American  during  the  past  century  as 
to  give  him  a  fair  right  to  count  upon  steady  advance  in 
time  to  come? 

I  confidently  answer  for  him  that  there  is.  It  3s  his  de 
votion  to  the  principle  of  liberty. 

Do  you  ask  me  where  to  find  it  in  words?  Turn  we 
thenatonceto  the  immortal  scroll  ever  firmly  associ 
ated  with  the  solemnities  of  this  our  great  anniversary. 
There  lies  imbedded  in  a  brief  sentence  more  of  living 
and  pervading  force  than  could  have  ever  been  applied 
to  secure  permanence  to  all  the  vast  monuments  of  Egypt 
or  of  the  world. 

We  all  know  it  well,  but  still  I  will  repeat  it : 

"We  know  these  truths  to  be  self-evident:  1.  That 
all  men  are  created  equal.  2.  That  they  are  endowed  by 
their  Creator  with  inalienable  rights.  3.  That  among 
them  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness." 

I  have  considered  these  significant  words  as  vested 
with  a  virtue  so  subtle  as  certain  ultimately  to  penetrate 
the  abodes  of  mankind  all  over  the  world.  But  I  sepa 
rate  them  altogether  from  the  solemn  array  of  charges 
against  King  George,  which  immediately  follow  in  the 
Declaration.  These  may  have  been  just  or  they  may  not. 
In  the  long  interval  of  time  which  has  passed,  ample  op 
portunity  has  been  given  to  examine  the  allegations  with, 
more  calmness  than  when  they  were  freshly  made.  May 
I  venture  to  express  a  modest  doubt  whether  the  Sover 
eign  was  in  reality  such  a  cruel  tyrant  as  he  is  painted, 
and  whether  the  ministers  were  so  malignantly  deaf  to 
the  appeals  of  colonial  consanguinity  as  readers  of  this 
day  may  be  led,  from  the  language  used,  to  infer.  The 
passage  of  a  hundred  years  ought  to  inspire  calmness  in 
revising  all  judicial  decisions  in  history.  Let  us,  above 


32  Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  187G. 

all,  be  sure  that  we  are  right.  May  I  be  permitted  to  ex 
press  an  humble  belief  that  the  grave  errors  of  both  Sov 
ereign,  ministers  and  people  were  not  so  much  rooted  m 
a  spirit  of  willful  and  passionate  tyratyjy,  as  of  supercil 
ious  indifference ;  the  same  errors  I  might  add  which 
have  marked  the  policy  of  that  country  in  later  times, 
down  to  a  comparatively  recent  date.  A  very  little  show 
of  sympathy,  a  ready  ear  to  listen  to  alleged  grievances, 
perhaps  graceful  concessions  made  in  season,  a  disposi 
tion  to  look  at  coloiMsts  rather  as  brethren  than  as  ser 
vants  to  squeeze  something  out  of;  in  short,  fellowship 
and  not  haughtiness  might  have  kept  our  affections  as 
Englishmen  perhaps  down  to  this  day.  The  true  griev 
ance  was  the  treatment  of  the  colonies  as  a  burden  in 
stead  of  a  blessing ;  an  object  out  of  which  to  get  as  much 
and  to  which  to  give  as  little  as  possible.  Least  of  all 
was  there  any  conception  of  cultivating  common  affec 
tions  and  a  common  interest.  The  consequence  of  the 
mistake  thus  made  was  not  only  the  gradual  yet  steady 
alienation  of  the  people,  but  to  teach  them  habits  of  in 
dependence.  Then  came  at  last  the  appeal  to  brute  force 
—and  all  was  over.  Such  seems  to  be  the  true  cause  of 
the  breach,  and  not  so  much  willful  tyranny.  And  it  is 
quite  as  justifiable  a  reason  for  the  separation,  as  any  or 
all  of  the  more  vehemont  accusations  so  elaborately  ac 
cumulated  in  the  great  Declaration  of  177G. 


III. 
PERSONAL    FREEDOM. 

Passing  from  this  digression,  let  me  resume  the  consid 
eration  of  the  effect  of  the  adoption  of  the  great  seminal 
principle  which  I  have  already  pointed  out  as  the  pillar 
of  fire  illuminating  the  whole  of  our  later  path  as  an  in 
dependent  people.  That  this  light  has  been  no  mere 
flashy,  flickering,  or  uncertain  guide,  but  steadily  direct 
ing  us  toward  the  attainment  of  new  and  great  results, 
beneficial  not  more  immediately  to  ourselves  than  inci 
dentally  to  the  progress  of  the  other  nations  of  the  world, 
it  will  be  the  object  of  this  address  to  explain.  Let  us 
review  the  century. 

And  first  of  all  appears  as  a  powerful  influence  of  the 
new  doctrine  of  freedom,  though  indirectly  applied,  the 
cooperation  -with  us  in  our  struggle  of  the  Sovereign 
Louis  the  Sixteenth,  and  the  sympathy  of  the  people  of 
France.  This  topic  would  of  itself  suffice  for  an  address, 
but  I  have  so  much  more  to  say  relative  to  ourselves  as 
a  directing  power  that  I  must  content  myself  with 
simply  recalling  to  your  minds  what  France  was  in  1778, 
when  governed  by  an  absolute  monarch  cooperating 
with  us  in  establishing  our  principle,  but  solely  for  the 
motive  of  depressing  Great  Britain,  and  what  she  is  in 
this  our  centennial  year,  an  independent  Republic  ;  after 
long  and  severe  tribulation,  at  last  deliberately  ranging 
itself  as  a  disciple  of  our  school  and  frankly  recognizing 
the  force  of  our  great  law  of  liberty. 

Our  war  for  f re  dom  had  been  some  time  over,  and  the 


arduous  task  of  restoring  order  by  the  cooperation  of  the 
whole  sense  of  the  people  in  organizing  an  effective  form 
of  government,  the  first  experiment  of  the  kind  in  his 
tory,  had  been  crowned  by  the  spontaneous  selection  by 
that  people  of  the  true  hero  who,  having  proved  himself 
an  eminent  leader  and  trusty  guide  through  the  perils  of 
a  seven  years'  war,  was  called  to  labor  with  even  greater 
glory  to  be  the  successful  organizer  and  director  of  lib 
erty  toward  the  arts  of  peace. 

Looking  from  this  point  of  time  in  the  year  1789,  when 
this  original  experiment,  the  latest  and  the  most  delib 
erate  ever  attempted,  was  on  the  verge  of  trial,  it  now 
becomes  my  duty  to  pass  in  review  the  chief  objects 
which  have  been  secur-d  by  it  during  the  century.  Has. 
it  succeeded  or  has  it  failed  ?  Above  all,  what  has  it 
done  directly  and  indirectly  in  expanding  the  influence 
of  its  great  doctrine  of  liberty,  not  merely  at  home,  but 
over  the  wide  surface  of  sea  and  land— nay,  the  great 
globe  itself. 

Washington  was  President,  but  he  had  not  had  time  to 
collect  together  his  Cabinet  and  distribute  his  work  when 
events  occurred  which  demanded  immediate  attention. 
Without  waiting  for  the  advent  of  Jefferson,  whom  he 
had  chosen  as  his  aid  in  the  Department  of  Foreign  Af 
fairs,  he  drew  with  his  own  hand  certain  papers  of  in 
structions,  which  he  committed  to  the  charge  of  Mr. 
Gouverneur  Morris,  then  about  to  sail  for  Great  Britain, 
with  directions  to  confer  with  the  Ministry  on  the  subject 
in  hand.  Mr.  Morris  went  out  and  communicated  with 
the  British  Foreign  Secretary,  the  Duke  of  Leeds.  The 
object  was  to  negotiate  a  treaty  of  commerce,  a  very 
necessary  measure  at  the  time,  but  it  was  not  long  before 
another  and  much  more  embarrassing  matter  inter 
vened.  It  had  been  reported  to  Mr,  Morris  that  several 
persons,  claiming  to  be  American  citizens,  when  walking 
in  the  streets  of  London,  suspecting  no  guile,  had  been, 
after  the  fashion  of  that  day,  pounced  upon  by  a  ]*jess 
gang,  and  put  on  board  of  British  vessels  to  serve  as  sea 
men,  whether  they  would  or  no.  Here  was  the  beginning 
of  a  question  of  personal  freedom,  started  out  of  the 
earth  at  once,  which  no  American  agent  could  venture  to 
disregard.  Although  without  special  instructions,  Mr. 
Morris  did  not  hesitate  a  moment  to  submit  the  griev 
ance  to  the  consideratian  of  the  Minister.  That  dia:- 
nitary  contented  himself  with  an  evasive  answer,  and  the 
plea  of  thedifhculty  of  distinguishing  between  citizens 
speaking  the  same  language,  and  this  became  the  stand 
ing  pretext  for  the  seizure  of  Americans  for  many 
years.  The  act  itself,  looked  at  in  our  present  light, 
seems  to  have  been  brutal  enough,  even  when  applied  to 
subjects.  How  much  more  intolerable  when  invading 
the  liberty  of  men  bearing  no  allegiance  to  the  Crown  I  I 
doubt  whether  many  of  you  will  believe  me  when  I  tell 
you  how  many  Americans  underwent  this  kind  of 
slavery.  It  appears  from  the  official  papers  that  in  1798, 
651  persons  were  recorded  as  in  this  condition.  Eight 


The  Progress  of  Liberty— Adainc. 


33 


years  later  the  return  is  increased  to  2,273,  and  tlie  year 
after  it  amounted  to  4,229.  The  most  flagrant  act  of  all 
was  the  seizure  of  several  men  on  board  of  tlie  Chesa 
peake,  an  American  vessel  of  war,  by  a  formal  order  of 
an  Admiral  of  a  British  frigate  on  the  coast.  The 
ultimate  consequence  of  the  equivocating  course  of 
Great  Britain  was  that  this  grievance  entered  with  other 
causes  into  the  necessity  of  making  a  declaration  of  war. 

If  ever  there  \vas  a  question  of  liberty  under  the  defini 
tion  of  1776  it  seems  to  have  been  this,  and  the  success 
ive  Presidents  who  were  in  office  during  the  period, 
though  themselves  natives  and  citizens  of  a  region  least 
liable  to  be  subjected  to  danger  of  such  a  fate,  were  not 
the  least  energetic  and  determined  on  that  account  in 
upholding  the  right.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  not  without 
its  lesson  of  the  dangers  of  infatuation  among  purely 
party  politicians  to  find  that  the  spirit  of  liberty  burned 
with  much  the  most  qualified  lieat  in  the  regions  most 
inhabited  by  those  frequenting  the  seas,  and  therefore 
most  liable  to  enslavement.  The  singular  spectacle  then 
followed  of  the  perseverance  of  those  eminent  statesmen 
in  upholding,  even  at  the  cost  of  war,  of  the  rights  of 
that  portion  of  their  brethren  furthest  removed  from 
their  own  homesteads,  which  were  free  from  danger; 
while,  on  the  other  hand,  a  considerable  number  of  the 
population  of  the  coasts  absolutely  exhausted  all  the 
vials  of  their  wrath  upon  the  same  distinguished  states 
men  for  laboring  even  at  the  cost  of  war  to  secure  the 
safety  on  land  and  water  of  those  who  actually  were 
their  nearest  neighbors  and  friends. 

The  result,  you  all  know,  was  the  War  of  1812,  waged 
in  part  under  the  cry  of  free  trade  and  sailors'  rights.  A 
severe  trial,  but  abundantly  rewarded  by  the  benefit 
gained  for  liberty.  From  the  date  of  the  peace  with 
Great  Britain  down  to  the  present  hour  no  cause  of  com 
plaint  has  occurred  for  the  impressment  of  an  American 
citizen.  No  difficulty  in  distinguishing  citizenship  has 
been  experienced  even  though  no  change  has  been  made 
in  the  use  of  the  language  common  to  both  nations.  In 
short,  no  more  men  have  been  taken,  whether  on  land  or 
on  the  ocean,  by  force,  on  any  pretense  whatever. 

Singularly  enough,  however,  50  years  later  a  question 
of  parallel  import  suddenly  sprang  up  which  for  the  mo 
ment  threatened  to  present  the  same  nations  in  a  posi 
tion  precisely  reversed.  A  naval  commander  of  a  United 
States  war  vessel  assumed  the  right  to  board  a  British 
passenger  steamer  crossing  the  sea  on  her  way  home, 
and  to  seize  aad  carry  off  two  American  citizens,  just  as 
British  officers  had  done  in  former  times.  This  proceed 
ing  was  immediately  resented,  and  the  consequence  was 
a  new  step  in  favor  of  liberty  on  the  ocean,  for  the 
security  of  the  civilized  world.  The  great  waters  are 
now  open  to  all  nations,  and  the  flag  of  any  nation  covers 
all  who  sail  under  it  in  times  of  peace.  And  Great  Britain 
herself,  too  often  in  times  long  gone  by  meriting  the 
odious  title  of  tyrant  of  the  ocean,  by  resorting  to  other 


and  better  means  than  the  horrors  of  t\  e  press-gang,  has 
not  only  raised  the  character  of  her  own  marine,  but  has 
pledged  herself  to  follow  in  the  very  same  path  of  hu 
manity  and  civilization  first  marked  out  by  ourselves. 

IV. 
LIBERTY  ON  THE  SEAS. 

Such  is  the  first  example  o?  the  direct  effect  upon  liberty 
of  the  law  proclaimed  a  hundred  years  ago.  I  proceed 
to  consider  the  second  : 

In  this  year  of  our  Lord  1 876,  on  looking  back  upon  the 
events  of  the  century,  it  seems  almost  impossible  to  be 
lieve  that  human  liberty  should  have  been  then  held  in 
so  much  contempt  on  the  high  seas,  and  that  by  nations 
as  contemptible  in  character  as  weak  in  absolute  force. 

As  early  as  the  year  1785  two  American  vessels  follow 
ing  their  course  peaceably  over  the  ocean  were  boarded 
by  ships  fitted  out  by  the  Algerines,  then  occupying  an 
independent  position  on  the  Mediterranean  coast.  The 
vessels  were  plundered,  and  the  crew,  numbering  21 
American  freemen,  taken  to  Algiers  and  sold  for  slaves. 

Instead  of  protestation  and  remonstrance  and  fitting 
out  vessels  of  war  to  retort  upon  this  insolent  pirate, 
what  did  we  first  do  ?  What,  but  to  pray  the  assistance 
and  intervention  of  such  a  feeble  power  as  Sweden  to 
help  us  out  of  our  distress,  and  money  was  to  be  offered, 
not  merely  to  ransom  the  slaves,  but  to  bribe  the  bar 
barian  not  to  do  so  again.  Of  course,  he  went  to  work 
more  vigorously  than  before,  and  his  demands  became 
more  imperious  and  exacting.  The  patience  of  the  great 
Powers  of  Europe,  whom  he  treated  with  little  more 
deference,  only  furnishes  one  more  example  of  the  case 
with  which  mere  audacity  may  for  a  time  secure  advan 
tages  which  will  never  be  gained  by  fair  dealing  and 
good  will.  To  an  American  of  to-day  it  is  inexpressibly 
mortifying  to  review  the  legislation  of  the  country  on 
this  matter  at  that  time.  It  appears  that  so  early  as  the 
year  1791  President  Washington,  in  the  third  year  of  his 
service,  in  his  speech  to  Congress,  first  called  the  atten 
tion  of  that  body  to  the  subject.  On  the  15th  of  De 
cember  the  Senate  referred  the  matter  to  a  committee 
which  in  due  course  of  time  reported  a  resolution  to  this 
effect : 

Resolved,  That  the  Senate  advise  and  consent  that  the 
President  take  such  measures  as  he  may  think  neces 
sary  for  the  redemption  of  the  citizens  of  the  United 
States  now  in  captivity  at  Algiers,  provided— (mind  you)— 
prov:ded  the  expense  shall  not  exceed  $40,000. 

Congress  did  not  think  of  looking  at  the  Declaration  of 
Independence,  but  they  passed  the  resolution.  And 
what  was  the  natural  consequence?  The  consular  officer 
established  by  the  United  States  in  Algiers  on  learning 
the  result  approved  it,  but  added  this  significant  sen 
tence  : 

I  take  the  liberty  to  observe  that  there  is  no  doing  any 
business  of  importance  in  this  country  without  palming 
tae  ministry. 


34 


The  logic  of  all  this  was,  that  the  best  way  to  keep  our 
people  free  was  to  make  it  worth  the  while  of  the  minis 
try  to  make  them  slaves. 

The  natural  consequence  was  that  the  cost  of  these 
operations  ultimately  exceeded  $1,000,000,  and  the  ex 
ample  had  set  the  kindred  Barbary  powers  in  an  agony 
for  a  share  of  the  plunder.  In  February,  1802,  the  gross 
amount  of  expenditure  to  pacify  these  pirates  and  man- 
stealers  had  risen  to  $2,500,000,  a  sum  large  enough,  if 
properly  expended  on  a  naval  force,  to  have  cleared  them 
out  at  a  stroke. 

No  wonder,  then,  that  President  Jefferson  should  pres 
ently  begin  to  recur  to  his  draft  of  the  Declaration  of  In 
dependence.  Though  never  very  friendly  to  the  navy, 
lie  saw  that  freedom  was  at  stake,  so  that  in  his  annual 
message  of  1803  he  suggested  fitting  out  a  small  force 
for  the  Mediterranean,  in  order  to  restrain  the  Tripohne 
cruisers,  and  added  that  the  uncertain  tenure  of  peace 
with  several  other  of  the  Barbarj-  powers  might  eventu 
ally  require  even  a  reenforcement. 

So  said  Jefferson  to  Congress— but  his  words  were  not 
responded  to  with  promptness,  so  the  evil  went  on  in 
creasing.  The  insolence  of  all  the  petty  Barbary  States 
only  fattened  by  What  it  fed  on,  until  the  freedom  of 
American  seamen  in  the  Mediterranean  was  measured 
only  by  the  sums  that  could  be  paid  for  their  ransom. 
There  is  no  more  ignominious  part  of  our  history  than 
this. 

Driven  at  last  to  a  conviction  of  the  impolicy  of  this 
course,  President  Madison,  having  succeeded  to  the  chair, 
on  the  23d  of  February  sent  a  message  to  Congress 
recommending  a  declaration  of  war.  The  two  Houses 
had  become  at  last  convinced  that  money  voted  to  that 
end  would  go  farther  for  freedom  than  any  offers  of  ran 
som,  and,  therefore,  responded  promptly  to  the  call.  A 
naval  expedition  was  sent  out,  and  on  the  5th  of  Decem 
ber,  nine  months  after  his  first  adoption  of  the  new  pol 
icy,  he  had  a  noble  opportunity  of  reporting  to  the  same 
body  a  triumphant  justification  of  his  measure.  The  gal 
lant  Decatur  had  restored  the  law  of  freedom  in  this 
quarter  forever. 

Mr.  Madison  tells  the  siory  in  these  words : 

I  have  the  satisfaction  to  communicate  to  you  the  suc 
cessful  termination  of  the  war.  The  squadron  in  advance 
on  that  service  under  C  jmmodore  Decatur  lost  not  a  mo 
ment  after  its  arrival  in  the  Mediterranean,  in  seeking 
the  naval  force  of  the  enemy  then  cruising  in  that  sea, 
and  succeeded  in  capturing  two  of  his  ships.  The  high 
character  of  the  American  commander  was  brilliantly 
euetained  on  the  occasion,  who  brought  his  own  ship 
into  close  action  with  that  ol  his  adversary.  Having 
prepared  the  way  by  the  demonstration  of  American 
skill  and  prowess,  he  hastened  to  the  port  of  Algiers, 
where  peace  was  promptly  yielded  to  his  victorious  force. 
In  the  terms  stipulated,  the  right  and  honor  of  the  United 
States  were  particularly  consulted  by  a  perpetual  relin- 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 

the   Dey  of  all  pretense  of  tribute  from 


quishment  by 
them. 

The  Dey  subsequently  betrayed  his  inclination  to  break 
the  treaty,  and  ventured  to  demand  a  renewal  of  the  an 
nual  tribute  which  had  been  so  weakly  yielded  ;  but  the 
hour  had  passed  for  listening  to  feeble  counsels.  The 
final  answer  was  a  declaration  that  the  United  States 
preferred  war  to  tribute,  and  freedom  to  slavery.  They 
therefore  insisted  that  the  observation  of  the  treaty, 
which  abolished  forever  the  right  to  tribute  or  to  the  en 
slaving  of  American  citizens. 

There  never  has  been  since  a  auestion  about  the  right 
to  navigate  the  Mediterranean,  free  from  all  danger  of 
the  loss  of  personal  freedom.  It  is  due  to  the  Govern 
ment  of  Great  Britain  to  add  that  following  up  this  ex 
ample,  Lord  Exmouth  with  his  fleet  put  a  final  stop  to  all 
further  pretenses  of  these  barbarians  to  annoy  the  navi 
gation  of  that  sea.  France  has  since  occupied  the  king 
dom  of  Algiers,  and  the  abolition  of  slavery  there  was 
one  of  its  early  decrees.  Thus  has  happened  the  liber 
ation  of  that  superb  region  of  the  world,  the  nursery  of 
more  of  its  civilization  than  any  other,  from  all  further 
danger  of  relapsing  into  barbarism.  And  America  may 
fairly  claim  the  credit  of  having  initiated  in  modern 
times  the  policy  of  freedom  over  the  surface  of  its  clas 
sical  sea. 

V. 

PIRACY    SUPPRESSED. 

I  have  now  done  with  the  second  example  of  the  prog 
ress  of  freedom  as  enunciated  in  the  celebrated  scroll  set 
forth  a  hundred  years  ago.  America  had  contributed 
greatly  to  this  result,  but  a  moment  was  rapidly  ap 
proaching  when  her  agency  was  to  be  invoked  in  a  region 
much  nearer  home.  The  younger  generations  now  com 
ing  into  active  life  will  doubtless  be  astonished  to  learn 
that  not  much  more  than  half  a  century  ago  there  still 
survived  a  class  of  men  harbored  in  the  West  Indies,  suc 
cessors  of  the  bold  buccaneers  who,  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  became  the  terror  to  the  navigation  of  those 
seas.  They  will  wonder  still  more  when  I  tell  them  that 
both  ships  and  men  were  not  only  harbored  in  some  ports 
of  the  United  States,  but  were  actually  fitted  out  with  a 
view  to  the  plunder  that  might  be  levied  upon  the  legiti 
mate  trade  pursued  by  their  countrymen  and  people  of 
all  other  nations,  in  and  around  the  islands  of  the  Carib 
bean  Sea.  That  I  am  not  exaggerating  in  this  statement, 
I  will  prove  by  merely  reading  to  you  a  short  extract 
from  a  report  made  by  a  committee  of  the  House  of  Rep 
resentatives  of  the  United  States  in  the  year  1821  to 
prove  it. 

"  The  extent,"  it  says,  "  to  which  the  system  of  plun 
der  upon  the  ocean  is  carried  in  the  West  India  seas  ana 
Gulf  of  Mexico  is  truly  alarming,  and  calls  imperiously 
for  the  prompt  and  efficient  interposition  of  the  General 
Government.  Some  fresh  instance  of  the  atrocity  with 
which  the  pirates  infesting  those  seas  carry  on  their 


The  I'roffresa  of  Liberty— Adams. 


depredations,  accompanied,  too,  by  the  indiscriminate 
massacre  of  the  defenseless  and  unoffending,  is  brought 
by  almost  every  mail— so  that  the  intercourse  between 
the  northern  and  southern  sections  of  the  Union  is  al 
most  cut  off." 

My  friends,  this  picture,  painted  from  an  official  source, 
dates  back  only  fifty-five  years  ago  !  Could  we  believe  it 
as  possible  that  liberty  and  life  guaranteed  by  our  solemn 
declaration  of  1776  should  have  been  found  so  insecure 
in  our  immediate  neighborhood,  at  a  time,  too,  when  we 
were  boasting  in  thousands  of  orations,  on  this  our  anni 
versary,  of  the  great  progress  we  had  made  in  securing 
both  against  violence  ?  And  the  worst  of  it  all  was  that 
some  even  of  our  own  countrymen  should  have  been  sus 
pected  of  being  privy  to  such  raids.  I  shall  touch  this 
matter  no  further  than  to  say  that  not  long  afterward 
adequate  preparations  were  made  to  remove  this  pesti 
lent  annoyance,  and  to  reestablish  perfect  freedom  in 
crossing  these  waters.  This  work  was  so  effectiveljr  per 
formed  in  1824,  that  from  that  time  to  this  personal  lib 
erty  has  been  as  secure  there  as  in  any  other  best  pro 
tected  part  of  the  globe. 

Such  is  my  third  example  of  the  practical  advance  of 
human  freedom  under  the  trumpet  call  made  100  years 
ago. 

I  come  now  to  a  fourth  and  more  stupendous  measure 
following  that  call.  The  world-wide  famous  author  of  it 
had  not  been  slow  to  grasp  the  conception  that  the  aboli 
tion  of  all  trade  in  slaves  must  absolutely  follow  as  a 
corollary  from  his  general  principle.  The  strongest  proof 
of  it  is  found  in  the  original  draft  of  his  paper,  wherein 
he  directly  charged  it  as  one  of  the  greatest  grievances 
inflicted  upon  liberty  by  George,  that  he  had  counte 
nanced  the  trade.  The  passage  is  one  of  the  finest  in  the 
paper,  and  deserves  to  be  repeated  to-day.  It  is  in  these 
words  : 

"  He,  the  King,  has  waged  cruel  war  against  human 
nature  itself,  violating  its  most  sacred  rights  of  life  and 
liberty  in  the  persons  of  a  distant  people  who  never  of 
fended  him,  captivating  and  carrying  them  into  slavery 
:'-\  another  hemisphere,  or  to  incur  miserable  death  on 
their  transportation  thither.  This  piratical  warfare,  the 
opprobrium  of  infidel  powers,  is  the  warfare  of  the  Chris 
tian  King  of  Great  Britain.  Determined  to  keep  open  a 
market  where  n  en  should  be  bought  and  sold,  he  has 
prostituted  his  negative  for  suppressing  every  legislative 
attempt  to  prohibit  or  to  restrain  the  execrable  com 
merce." 

There  is  no  passage  so  fine  as  this  in  the  Declaration. 
Unfortunately  it  hit  too  hard  upon  some  interest  close 
at  home  which  proved  strong  enough  to  have  it  dropped 
from  the  final  draft.  But  though  lost  there,  its  essence 
almost  coeval  with  the  first  publication  of  Granville 
Sharp  in  England  on  the  same  subject,  undoubtedly  per 
vaded  the  agitation  which  never  ceased  in  either  country 
until  final  legislation  secured  a  victory.  The  labors  of 


Sharp  and  Wilberforce,  of  Clarkson  and  Buxton,  as  welf 
as  many  others,  have  placed  them  upon  an  eminence  of 
honor  throughout  the  world.  But  their  struggle,  whicii 
began  in  1787,  was  not  terminated  for  a  period  of  twenty 
years.  On  the  other  hand,  it  appears  from  the  statute 
book  in  1794,  it  was  enacted  by  the  Congress  of  thf> 
United  States  in  these  words  :  "  That  no  vessel  shall  be 
fitted  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  on  any  traffic  in  slaves 
to  any  foreign  country,  or  lor  procuring  from  any  for 
eign  country  the  inhabitants  thereof  to  be  disposed  of  as 
slaves."  This  act  was  followed  in  due  course  by  others/ 
which,  harmonizing  with  the  action  of  foreign  nations,  is 
believed  to  have  put  an  effective  and  permanent  stop  to 
one  of  the  vilest  abominations,  as  conducted  on  the 
ocean,  that  was  ever  permitted  in  the  records  of  time. 

But  all  this  laborious  effort  had  been  directed  only 
against  the  cruelties  practiced  iu  the  transportation  of 
negro  slaves  over  the  seas.  It  did  not  touch  the  question 
of  his  existing  condition  or  of  his  right  to  be  free. 

VI. 
LIBERTY  TO  ALL. 

This  brings  me  to  the  fifth  and  greatest  of  all  fruits  of 
the  charter  of  Independence,  the  proclamation  of  lib 
erty  to  the  captive  through  a  great  part  of  the  civilized 
world. 

The  seed  that  had  been  sown  broadcast  over  the  world 
fell  much  of  it  as  described  in  the  Scripture,  some  of  it 
sprouting  too  early  as  in  France,  and  yielding  none  but 
bitter  fruit,  but  more,  after  living  in  the  ground  many 
years,  producing  results  most  propitious  to  the  advance 
ment  of  mankind.  It  would  be  tedious  for  me  to  go  into 
details  describing  the  progress  of  the  revolution  that  has 
changed  the  face  of  civilization.  The  principle  enunci 
ated  iu  our  precious  scroll  has  done  its  work  in  Great 
Britain  and  in  France,  and  most  of  all  in  the  immense 
expanse  of  the  territories  of  the  Autocrat  of  all  the 
Russias,  who  of  his  own  mere  motion  proclaimed  that 
noble  decree  which  liberated  from  serfdom  at  one  stroke 
23,000,000  of  the  human  race.  This  noble  act  will  re 
main  forever  one  of  the  grandest  steps  toward  the  ele 
vation  of  mankind  ever  taken  by  the  will  of  a  sovereign 
of  any  race  in  any  age. 

But  though  freely  conceding  the  spontaneous  volition 
of  the  Czar  in  this  instance,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  affirm 
that  but  for  the  subtle  essence  infused  into  the  political 
sentiment  of  the  age  by  the  great  Declaration  of  1776, 
he  would  never  have  been  inspired  with  the  lofty  magna 
nimity  essential  to  the  completion  of  his  work. 

I  come  next  and  last  to  the  remembrance  of  the  fearful 
conflict  for  the  maintenance  of  the  grand  principle  to 
which  we  had.  pledged  ourselves  at  the  very  outset  of  our 
national  career,  and  out  of  which  we  have,  by  the  bless 
ing  of  the  Almighty,  come  safe  and  sound.  The  history 
is  so  fresh  in  our  minds  that  there  is  no  need  of  recalling 
its  details,  neither  would  I  do  so  if  there  were,  on  a  day 


30 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


consecrated  like  this  to  the  harmony  of  the  nation. 
Never  was  the  first  aspect  of  any  contention  surrounded 
by  darker  clouds,  yet  viewing  as  we"  must  its  actual 
issue,  at  no  time  has  there  ever  been  more  reason  to  re 
joice  in  the  present  and  look  forward  to  a  still  more  bril 
liant  future.  Now  that  the  agony  is  over,  who  is  there 
that  will  not  admit  that  he  does  not  rejoice  at  the  re 
moval  of  the  ponderous  burden  which  weighed  down  our 
spirits  in  earlier  days  ?  The  great  law  proclaimed  at  the 
beginning  of  our  course  has  been  at  last  fully  carried 
out.  No  more  apologies  for  inconsistency  to  caviling 
and  evil-minded  objectors.  No  more  unwelcome  com 
parisons  with  the  superior  liberality  of  absolute  rnon- 
archs  in  distant  regions  of  the  eartb.  Thank  God,  now 
there  is  not  a  man  who  treads  the  soil  of  this  broad  land, 
void  of  offense,  who  in  the  eye  of  the  law  does  not  stand 
on  the  same  level  with  every  other  man.  If  the  memorable 
words  of  Thomas  Jefferson,  that  true  Apostle  of  Liberty, 
had  done  only  this  it  would  alone  serve  to  carry  him 
aloft,  high  up  among  the  benefactors  of  mankind.  Not 
America  alone,  but  Europe  and  Asia,  and  above  all 
Africa,  nay  the  great  globe  itself,  move  in  an  orbit  never 
80  resplendent  as  now. 

Let  me  now  sum  up  in  brief  the  results  arrived  at  by 
the  enunciation  of  the  great  law  of  liberty  in  177G  : 

1.  It   opened   the   way   to   the   present   condition  of 
France. 

2.  It  brought  about  perfect  security  for  liberty  on  the 
high  and  narrow  seas. 

3.  It  led  the  way  in  abolishing  the  slave  trade,  which 
in  its  turn,  prompted  the  abolition  of  slavery  itself  by 
Great  Britain,  France,  Russia,  and  last  of  all,  by  our  own 
country  too. 

Standing  now  on  this  vantage  ground,  gained  from  the 
severe  struggle  of  the  past,  the  inquiry  naturally  pre 
sents  itself,  What  have  we  left  for  us  to  do  1  To  which  I 
will  frankly  answer,  much.  It  is  no  part  of  my  disposi 
tion,  even  on  the  brightest  of  our  festival  days,  to  deal  in 
indiscriminate  laudation,  or  even  to  cast  a  flimsy  vail 
over  the  less  favorable  aspects  of  our  national  position. 
1  will  not  deny  that  many  of  the  events  that  have  hap 
pened  since  our  escape  from  the  last  great  peril,  indicate 
more  forcibly  than  I  care  to  admit,  some  decline  from 
that  high  standard  of  moral  and  political  purity  for 
which  we  have  ever  before  been  distinguished.  The 
adoration  of  Mammon,  .described  by  the  poet  as  the 
"  least  erected  spirit  that  fell  from  Heaven,  for  e'en  in 
Heaven  his  looks  and  thoughts  were  always  downward 
bent,"  has  done  something  to  impair  the  glory  earned  by 
all  our  preceding  sacrifices.  For  myself,  while  sincerely 
mourning  the  mere  possibility  of  stain  touching  our  gar 
ments,  I  feel  not  the  less  certainty  that  the  heart  of  the 
people  remains  as  sound  as  ever. 


VII. 
WASHINGTON. 

One  of  the  strongest  muniments  to  save  us  from  all 
harm  it  gives  me  pride  to  remind  you  of,  especially  on 
this  dajr— I  mean  the  memory  of  the  example  of  Wash 
ington. 

Whatever  misfortune  may  betide  us,  of  one  thing  we 
may  be  sure,  that  the  study  of  that  model  by  the  rising 
youth  of  our  land  can  never  fail  to  create  a  sanative 
force  potent  enough  to  counteract  every  poisonous  ele 
ment  in  the  political  atmosphere. 

Permit  me  for  a  few  moments  to  dwell  upon  this  topic, 
for  I  regard  it  as  closely  intertwined  with  much  of  the 
success  we  have  hitherto  enjoyed  as  an  independent  peo 
ple.  Far  be  it  from  me  to  raise  a  visionary  idol.  I  have 
lived  too  long  to  trust  in  mere  panegyric.  Fulsome  eu 
logy  of  any  man  raises  with  me  only  a  smile.  Indiscrim 
inate  laudation  is  equivalent  to  falsehood.  Washington, 
as  I  understand  him,  was  gifted  with  nothing  ordinarily 
defined  as  genius,  and  he  had  not  had  great  advantages 
of  education.  His  intellectual  powers  were  clear,  but 
not  much  above  the  average  men  of  his  time.  What 
knowledge  he  possessed  had  been  gained  from  associa 
tion  with  others  in  his  long  public  career,  rather  than  by 
secluded  study.  As  as  actor  he  scarcely  distinguished 
himself  by  more  than  one  brilliant  stroke;  as  a  writer 
the  greater  part  of  his  correspondence  discloses  nothing 
more  than  average  natural  good  sense ;  and  on  the  field 
of  battle  his  powers  pale  before  the  splendid  strategy  of 
Napoleon  Bonaparte. 

Yet,  notwithstanding  all  these  deductions,  the  thread 
of  his  life  from  youth  to  age  displays  a  maturity  of 
judgment,  a  consistency  of  principle,  a  steadiness  of  ac 
tion,  a  discriminating  wisdom,  and  a  purity  of  purpose 
hardly  found  united  to  the  same  extent  in  any  other  in 
stance  I  can  recall  in  history.  Of  his  entire  disinterest 
edness  in  all  his  pecuniary  relations  with  the  public  it  ia 
needless  for  me  to  apeak.  More  than  all  and  above  all, 
he  was  always  master  of  himself.  If  there  be  one  quality 
more  than  another  in  his  character  which  may  exercise 
a  useful  control  over  the  men  of  the  present  hour,  it  is 
the  total  disregard  of  self,  when  in  the  most  elevated 
positions  for  influence  and  example. 

In  order  more  fully  to  illustrate  my  position,  let  me  for 
one  moment  contrast  his  course  with  that  of  the  great 
military  chief  I  have  already  named.  The  star  of  Napo 
leon  was  just  rising  to  its  zenith  as  that  of  Washington 
passed  away.  In  point  of  military  genius  Napoleon 
probably  equaled  if  he  did  not  exceed  any  person  known 
in  history.  In  regard  to  the  direction  of  the  interests  of 
a  nation  he  may  have  occupied  a  very  high  place.  He 
inspired  an  energy  and  a  vigor  in  the  veins  of  the  French 
people  which  they  sadly  needed  after  the  demoralizing 
sway  of  centuries  of  Bonrbon  kings.  With  even  a  smaller 
'• •";••"•••  '•<•  «•>•" 


The  Advance  of  a  Century — Beecher. 


too  might  have  left  a  people  to  honor  his  memory  down 
to  the  la  best  times.  But  it  was  not  to  be.  Do  you  ask 
the  reason  1  It  is  this.  His  motives  of  action  always 
centered  in  self.  His  example  gives  a  warning  but  not  a 
guide.  For  when  selfishness  animates  a  ruler  there  is  no 
cause  of  surprise  if  he  sacrifice,  without  scruple,  an  entire 
generation  of  men  as  a  holocaust  to  the  great  principle 
of  evil,  merely  to  maintain  or  extend  his  sway.  Had 
Napoleon  copied  the  example  of  Washington  he  would 
have  been  the  idol  of  all  later  generations  in  France.  For 
Washington  to  have  copied  the  example  of  Napoleon 
•would  have  been  simply  impossible. 

Let  us,  then,  discarding  all  inferior  strife,  hold  up  to 
our  children  the  example  of  Washington  as  the  symbol, 
not  merely  of  wisdom,  but  of  purity  and  truth. 

Let  us  labor  continually  to  keep  the  advance  in  civil 
ization  as  it  becomes  us  to  do  after  the  struggles  of  the 


past,  so  that  the  rights  to  life,  to  liberty,  and  the  pursuit 
of  happiness,  which  we  have  honorably  secured,  may  be 
firmly  entailed  upon  the  ever-enlarging  generations  of 
mankind. 

And  what  is  it,  I  pray  you  tell  me,  that  has  brought  uo 
to  the  celebration  of  this  most  memorable  day  1  Is  it  not 
the  steady  cry  of  excelsior  up  to  the  most  elevated 
regions  of  political  purity,  secured  to  us  by  the  memory 
of  those  who  have  passed  before  us  and  consecrated  the 
very  ground  occupied  by  their  ashes  1  Gloriously  indeed 
may  it  be  said  of  it  in  the  words  of  the  poet : 

What's  hallowed  ground  1    "Tis  what  gives  birth 
To  sacred  thoughts  in  souls  of  worth- 
Peace!  Independence!  Truth!  go  forth 

Earth's  compass  round, 
And  your  high  priesthood  shall  make  earth 

All  hallow'd  ground. 


THE     ADVANCE     OF    A    CENTURY. 


THE  REV.  HENRY  WARD  BEECHER  AT  PEEKSKILL,  N.  Y. 


1. 

Of  all  the  places  on  this  continent  where, 
from  political  considerations,  vast  assemblies  should 
gather  to-day,  there  is  no  place  that  can  equal  Philadel 
phia,  where  that  orator  and  statesman  and  civilian, 
Evarts,  is  holding  in  rapt  attention  the  great  crowds. 
But  if  it  be  not  a  question  of  political  interest,  but  of 
military,  I  know  of  no  other  point  throughout  the  land 
•where  the  people  may  more  fitly  assemble  for  retrospect 
and  for  pride  than  in  this  goodly  place  of  Peekskill 
[Applause.]  For  we  stand  in  the  very  center  of  the 
military  operations  that  were  conducted  in  the  northern 
part  of  our  then  country.  The  great  ferry— the  King's 
Ferry — by  which  chief  communication  was  had  between 
all  New-England  and  New-Jersey  and  Pennsylvania,  in 
which  bounds  there  was  the  greatest  part  of  the  popula 
tion  of  the  country,  lies  right  opposite  to  us.  This  is  the 
center  of  that  sphere,  of  that  vast  drama.  (At  this 
point  the  cannon  on  the  adjacent  hill  was  fired.  Mr. 
Beecher  stopped  for  an  instant,  but  he  immediately  said, 
"  1  have  spoken  very  often,  but  I  have  never  been 
punctuated  with  the  cannon  before.")  [Great  laughter 
and  applause.]  But  as  I  was  saying,  around  this  region 
•was  that  great  drama  played— the  treachery  of  Arnold 
and  the  sad  recompense  upon  Andre.  In  these  streets 
our  armies  have  trod ;  in  this  town  Washington  dated, 
indeed,  the  commission  which  -was  last  received  by 
Arnold  at  the  hands  of  his  countrymen.  Off  upon  this 


bay  hovered  the  British  fleet.  (The  cannon  again  gave  a 
deafening  report,  causing  Mr.  Beecher  to  say,  "  I  have 
no  objection  to  being  canonized,  but  don't  like  to  be 
cannonaded.")  [Great  laughter.]- 

A  hundred  years  have  passed  since  this  region  was  the 
theater  of  such  stirring  scenes  arid  vicissitudes.  A  hun 
dred  years  i.«  %  long  period  in  the  life  of  a  man— a  short 
period  in  the  life  of  a  nation.  A  hundred  years  I  It  is 
1 ,800  since  the  Advent ;  a  thousand  years  scarcely  take  us 
back  beyond  the  beginning  of  European  nations  in  their 
modern  form.  A  hundred  years  is  scarcely  the  "  teen  " 
to  which  nations  come.  And  it  seldom  happens  that  any 
nation  has  for  its  thousand  such  a  hundred  years  as  that 
whicnhas  been  vouchsafed  to  us.  From  a  population 
of  scant  3,000,000,  including  the  slave  population,  we 
have  swelled  to  more  than  40,000,000.  Behind  a  small 
strip  of  settled  territory  lining  the  Atlantic  coast  almost  no 
one  except  the  pioneers's  foot  had  trod  the  mountain 
path,  had  pressed  the  soil  of  the  country  beyond.  Now 
the  Atlantic  and  the  Pacific  are  joined  by  the  iron  road, 
and  that  has  come  to  pass  in  reality  which  in  the  Scrip 
ture  is  spoken  of  in  poetry — "  deep  answers  unto  deep," 
and  the  ocean  breaks  upon  one  shore  to  be  answered  by 
the  other;  and  all  the  way  across  are  thickly-settled 
communities,  towns,  and  cities  innumerable.  And  yet 
this  is  but  small  as  compared  with  the  augmentation  of 
material  interests.  The  wealth  that  scarcely  now  is  com 
putable,  the  industries  that  thrive,  the  inventions,  the 


38 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


discoveries,  the  organizations  of  labor  and  of  capital,  the 
vast  spread  of  the  industries  over  the  valleys  and  hills— 
who  can  estimate  that  of  the  early  day  which  was  but  as 
a  seed  compared  with  that  of  our  day  which  moves  like 
Lebanon  ?  And  yet  what  are  the  sheen  and  ships  and 
rails,  and  what  are  granaries  and  roads  and  canals, 
what  a?e  herds  upon  a  thousand  hills,  what  are  all  these 
in  comparison  with  man  !  All  labor  and  the  products  of 
labor  are  valuable  only  as  they  promote  the  virtue  and 
the  comfort  of  man — are  valuable  only  as  they  promote 
the  manhood  which  is  in  man.  Though  we  had  a  quad 
rupled  wealth,  yet  if  the  people  were  decayed  or  en 
feebled,  what  would  our  property  be  worth  1  Not  worth 
the  assembling  here  to  look  back  upon,  or  to  look  for 
ward  to.  The  value  of  our  material  growth  is  to  be  esti 
mated  by  its  eftect  upon  the  people. 

What  has  been  the  history  of  a  hundred  years  In  re 
gard  to  the  people  of  America  1  Are  they  as  virtuous  as 
they  were  a  hundred  years  ago?  Are  they  as  manly  as 
they  were  a  hundred  years  ago?  Are  they  as  intelligent, 
are  they  as  religious  as  they  were  a  hundred  years  ago  ? 
Not  only  that — are  these  individuals  that  are  perhaps,  as 
we  shall  examine,  more  or  less  religious,  moral,  intelli 
gent,  happy— have  they  learned  anything  in  the  highest 
of  all  arts,  the  art  of  man  to  live  with  man,  the  art  of 
organizing  society,  of  conducting  government,  the  pro 
motion  of  the  common  weal  through  broad  spaces  and 
through  vast  multitudes?  What  is  the  history  of  the 
people?  What  are  we  to-day?  What  our  fathers  were 
we  know.  Their  life  was  splendid;  their  history  was 
registered.  WTe  read  what  they  were,  and  form  an  esti 
mate  of  them  with  gratitude  to  God;  but  what  are  we, 
their  sous?  Have  we  shrunk?  Are  we  unworthy  of 
their  names,  and  places,  and  functions,  which  have  been 
transmitted  from  their  hands  to  ours?  What  are  the 
laws,  what  are  the  institutions,  what  is  the  Government, 
what  are  the  policies  of  this  great  nation,  redeemed  from 
foreign  thrall  to  home  independence?  Are  they  commit 
ted  to  puny  hands,  or  is  manhood  broadened  and 
strengthened  and  ennobled?  Look  then  at  our  popula 
tion,  what  it  is,  spread  abroad  through  all  the  laud.  It 
might  be  said  that  America  represents  every  nation  on 
the  globe  better  than  the  nation  represents  itself.  We 
Lave  the  best  things  they  have  got  in  Ireland,  for  we 
have  stripped  her  almost  bare.  We  have  the  canny 
Scotchman  in  great  numbers  among  us,  though  not 
enough  for  our  good.  We  have  the  Englishman  among  us, 
and  are  suspected  ourselves  of  having  English  blood 
in  our  veins.  We  have  also  those  from  Norway,  Sweden, 
Denmark,  Russia  even,  Germany,  Austria  and  Hungary, 
Ita'y,  Spain,  France,  Switzerland.  We  can  cull  from  all 
these  nations  out  of  our  population  many  members  of 
whom  they  are  not  ashamed  and  for  whom 
we  are  grateful.  We  have  our  fields  tilled  by  foreign 
hands,  our  roads  built  by  them.  This  is  a  matter  of 
political  economy,  but  the  question  which  I  propose  to 


you  is,  What  are  they  as  component  elements  of  a  ne-vr 
American  stock  ?  Do  you  believe  in  stock ;  do  you  b»- 
lieve  in  blood  ?  I  do.  Do  you  believe  in  crossing  judi 
ciously  ?  Do  you  believe  that  the  best  blood  of  all  na 
tions  will  ultimate  by  and  by  in  a  better  race  than  the 
primitive  and  the  uncomplex  race,  mixing  new  strength 
and  alliances?  We  have  fortified  our  blood,  enriched 
our  blood ;  we  have  called  the  world  to  be  our  father  and 
the  father  of  our  children  and  posterity,  and  there  never 
was  a  time  in.  the  history  of  this  nation  when  the  race- 
stock  had  in  it  so  much  that  was  worth  the  study  of  the 
physiologist  and  philanthropist  as  to-day.  We  are  en<- 
riched  beyond  the  power  of  gratitude.  1  for  one  regard 
all  the  inconveniences  of  foreign  mixtures,  of  difference 
of  language,  the  difference  of  customs,  the  difference  at 
religion,  the  difference  in  domestic  arrangement— I  re 
gard  all  these  inconveniences  as  a  trifle ;  but  the  aug 
mentation  of  power,  of  breadth  of  manhood,  the  prom 
ise  of  the  future,  is  past  all  computation,  and  there  never 
was,  there  never  began  to  be  in  the  early  day  such  prom 
ise  for  physical  vigor  and  enriched  life  as  there  is  to-day 
upon  this  continent. 

II. 
CONDITIONS  OF  EXISTENCE  AND  HAPPINESS. 

And  now  consider  that  not  only  is  this  race-stock  for 
these  reasons  made  a  better  one  than  that  which  existed 
a  hundred  years  ago,  but  consider  that  the  conditions  of 
existence  among  the  whole  population  are  better  than 
they  were  a  hundred  years  ago.  We  not  only  wear  better 
heads,  but  we  have  better  bellies  [great  laughter], 
with  better  food  in  them.  We  have  also  better  clothes 
now.  In  other  words,  the  art  of  living  healthily  has  ad 
vanced  immensely,  and  though  cities  have  enlarged,  and 
though  the  causes  of  dangers  to  sanitary  conditions  are 
multiplied,  science  has  kept  pace,  and  there  never  was  a 
time,  I  will  not  say  in  our  own  history,  but  in  the  history 
of  any  nation  on  the  globe,  when  the  condi 
tions  of  life  were  so  wholesome,  the  conditions 
of  happiness  so  universally  diffused,  as  they  are 
to-day  in  this  great  land.  We  grumble— we  Inherit  that 
from  our  ancestors ;  we  often  mope  and  vex  ourselves 
with  melancholy  prognostications  concerning  this  or 
that  danger.  Some  men  are  born  to  see  the  devil  of  mel 
ancholy ;  they  would  see  him  sitting  in  the  very  door  of 
heaven,  methiuks.  Not  I ;  for  though  there  be  mischiefs 
and  troubles,  yet  when  we  look  at  the  great  conditions  of 
human  life  in  society,  and  they  have  been  augmented  fa 
vorably,  they  never  were  so  favorable  as  they  are  to-day. 
More  than  that;  if  you  will  look  at  the  diversity  of  the 
industries  by  which  men  ply  their  hands,  if  we  look  at 
the  accumulating  power  of  the  average  citizen,  you  will 
find  that  it  is  in  the  power  of  a  man  to  earn  more  in  a 
single  ten  years  of  his  life  to-day  than  for  our  ancestors 
in  the  whole  of  their  life.  The  heavens  are  nearer  to  us 
than  to  them,  for  we  have  learned  the  secrets  of  the 


The  Advance  of  a  Century— Becclicr. 


39 


storm  and  the  sweep  of  the  lightning.  The  earth  itself 
is  but  just  outside  our  door.  We  can  now  call  to  Asia 
and  the  distant  parts  of  the  earth  easier  than  they  could 
to  Boston  or  Philadelphia  a  hundred  years  ago :  and  all 
the  fleets  of  the  world  bring  hither  the  tribute  of  the 
ylobe.  ana  that  not  for  the  rich  man  and  the  sumptuous 
In e",  but  for  the  common  folks  of  the  land  to  which  we 
all  belong.  The  houses  in  which  we  live  are  better  ;  bet 
ter  warmed  in  Winter— and  our  Summers  are  very  well 
warmed  too.  The  implements  by  which  the  common 
man  works  are  multiplied ;  the  processes  which  he  can 
control,  and  which  are  organized  in  society  that  he  gets 
the  reflex  benefit  of  them,  are  incalculable.  And  all  that 
the  soil  has,  and  all  that  the  sea  has,  and  all  that  the 
mountain  locks  up,  and  all  that  is  invisible  in  the  atmos 
phere,  are  so  many  servitors  working  in  this  great 
democratic  land  for  the  multitude,  for  the  great  mass  of 
The  common  people.  We  are  in  that  regard  advanced  far 
beyond  the  days  of  our  fathers ;  for  then  they  had  not 
escaped  from  the  hereditary  notions,  or  aristocratic 
thoughts,  the  aristocratic  classes,  or  the  aristocratic  ten 
dencies  even  in  government.  But  the  progress  of 
democracy— which  is  not  merely  political,  but  which  is 
religious,  in  literature,  art,  even  in  mechanics— the  wave 
of  democratic  influence  has  been  for  a  hundred  years 
washing  in  further  and  further  toward  the  feet  of  the 
common  people.  And  to-day  there  is  not  on  the  face  of 
the  globe  another  forty  millions  that  have  such  ampli 
tude  of  sphere,  such  strength  of  purpose,  such  instru 
ments  to  their  hand,  such  capital  for  them,  such  oppor 
tunity,  such  happiness.  And  that  leads  me  to  speak — 
going  aside  from  the  common  people  individually  or  as 
in  classes — of  their  institutions,  and  let  me  begin  where 
you  began,  in  the  household. 

III. 
CHANGES    IN    THE    HOUSEHOLD. 

What  is  the  family  and  household  to-day  as  compared 
with  the  family  and  household  a  hundred  years  ago  9  Time 
is  a  great  magnifying  medium.  We  look  back  a  hundred 
years  and  think  that  influences  of  the  household  and  of 
society  must  have  been  better,  purer,  than  they  are  to-day. 
No,  no.  If  there  be  one  thing  that  has  grown  in  solidity 
and  grandeur,  in  richness  and  purity  and  refinement,  it 
has  been  the  American  household.  Oh,  there  were  here 
and  there  notable  mansions,  here  and  there  notable 
households  of  intelligence  and  virtue  in  the  olden  day. 
But  we  are  concerned  with  the  averages ;  and  the  average 
American  household  is  wiser,  there  is  more  material  for 
thought,  for  comfort,  for  home  love,  to-day,  in  the  ordi 
nary  workman's  house,  than  there  was  a  hundred  years 
ago  in  one  of  a  hundred  rich  men's  mansions  and  build 
ings.  For  no  man  among  us  is  so  poor — unless  he  drinks 
whisky  too  much— no  man  that  is  well  born  among  us— 
and  to  be  well  born  it  is  necessary  first  to  have  been  born 
at  all.  and  secondly,  to  have  been  born  out  of  virtuous 


parents,  who  set  him  a  good  example— no  man  has  been 
well  born  in  this  laud  who  needs  to  stand  at  the  bottom 
of  the  ladder  20  years.  The  laborer  ought  to  be  ashamed 
of  himself— or  to  find  fault  with  Providence  that  stinted 
him  when  he  was  endowed— who  in  20  years  does  not 
own  the  ground  on  which  his  house  stands,  and 
that,  too,  an  unmortgaged  house;  who  has  not  iu 
that  house  provided  carpets  tor  the  rooms,  who  has 
not  his  China  plates,  who  has  not  his  chromos,  who  has 
not  some  picture  or  portrait  hanging  upon  the  walls, 
who  has  not  some  books  nestling  on  the  shelf,  who  has 
not  there  a  household  that  he  can  call  his  home,  the 
sweetest  place  upon  the  earth.  This  is  not  the  picture 
of  some  future  time,  but  the  picture  of  to-day,  a  picture 
of  the  homes  of  the  workingmen  of  America.  The 
average  workingman  lives  better  now  in  the  household 
and  in  the  family  than  he  did  a  hundred  years  ago.  But 
we  have  come  to  it  steadily,  without  record  or  observa 
tion.  Yet  it  is  none  the  less  true  that  the  average 
condition  of  the  household  for  domestic  comfort  has 
gone  up  more  than  one  per  cent  for  every  year  of  the 
last  100  years. 

But  that  is  not  all.  The  members  of  the  household 
have  also  developed,  and  chiefly  she  into  whose  hand 
God  put  the  rudder  of  time.  For  if  Eve  plucked  the 
apple  that  Adam  might  help  her  to  eat  it,  she  has  been 
beforehand  with  him  ever  since  and  steered  him.  The 
household  that  has  a  bad  woman  may  have  an  augel  for 
a  husband,  but  he  is  helpless.  The  household  that  has  a 
brute  for  a  husband  is  safe  if  the  woman  be  God's  own 
woman.  Franklin  said  that  a  man  is  what  his  wife  will 
let  him  be.  It  is  more  than  a  proverb  that  the  children 
are  what  the  mother  makes  them.  She  is  the  legislator 
of  the  household ;  she  is  the  judge  that  sits  upon  the 
throne  of  love.  All  severity  comes  from  love  in  a  moth 
er's  hand  ;  she  is  the  educator;  she  also  is  the  atonement 
when  sins  and  transgressions  have  brought  children  to 
shame.  The  altar  of  penitence  is  at  the  mother's  knee,, 
and  not  the  heart  of  God  knows  better  how  to  forgive 
than  does  she.  If  womanhood  has  gone  down,  woe  be  to 
us ;  the  richer  we  are,  the  stronger  we  are,  the  worse  we 
are.  And  if  woman  has  gone  up  in  intelligence,  in  influ 
ence,  in  virtue,  and  in  religion,  then  the  country  is  safe, 
though  its  fleets  were  sunk  and  its  cities  were  burned, 
though  its  crops  were  mildewed  and  blasted.  For  easy  is 
recovery  where  the  head  forces  are  sound ;  but  where 
there  is  corruption  at  the  central  point  of  power  all  out 
ward  helps  are  in  vain.  I  declare  that  in  the  last  one 
hundred  years  woman,  who  before  had  brooded  and 
blossomed  in  aristocratic  circles,  has  now  come  to  blos 
som  through  democratic  circles,  and  is  in  America  to-day 
undisputed  and  uncontradicted  what  before  she  has  been 
allowed  to  oe  only  when  she  had  a  coronet  upon  her  brow, 
or  some  scepter  of  power  in  her  hand.  Not  only  is  she 
unvailed,  not  only  is  she  permitted  to  show  her  face 
where  men  do  most  congregate,  not  only  is  she  a  power 


40 


Independence  Day  Orations.  July  4.  187G. 


in  the  silence  oi  the  house,  but  in  the  church  a  teacher. 
Paul  from  a  thousand  years  ago  may  in  vain  now  say, 
"  Let  not  your  women  teach  in  the  church."  Th°y  cannot 
come  there  without  being  teachers  and  silent  letters. 
They  are  the  books  and  epistles  known  and  read  of  all 
men.  They  have  come  to  that  degree  of  knowledge,  they 
have  come  to  that  breadth  of  intellect  and  power,  they 
have  learned  how  to  dispose  of  that  primary  and  highest 
gift,  moral  intuition,  which  God  gave  to  them  in 
excess,  chetiting  mnn,  they  have  come  to  such 
influence  and  grandeur  that  never  before  m  any 
land,  certainly  never  m  our  own,  has  womanhood 
attained  such  authority  and  eminence  as  at  the  present 
day.  That  power  which  is  now  latent  and  applied  indi 
rectly,  is  soon  to  fill  the  channels  that  shall  be  direct  aud 
initial.  You  may  die  too  soon,  as  many  have  before 
they  saw  the  beatific  vision,  but  you  that  live  long 
enough  will  see  woman  vote,  and  when  you  see  woman 
vote,  you  will  see  less  fraud,  less  selfishness,  less  brutal 
ity,  and  more  public  spirit  and  rectitude  and  harmony  in 
the  administration  of  public  affairs.  I  do  not  propose 
to  discuss  the  question  at  any  length  with  you,  but  I  can 
not  without  thanksgiving,  I  caunot  fail  to  recognize  that 
steady  advance  which  is  sure  to  make  woman  a  voter  in 
this  generation. 

IV. 

EXTENSION  OF  THE  SUFFRAGE. 
In  the  beginning  of  our  history  no  man  could  vote  that 
was  not  a  member  of  the  church  ;  and,  by  the  way,  the 
deacons,  to  relieve  the  church  members  from  the  trouble 
of  calling  at  the  ballot-boxes,  took  their  hats  and  went 
around  and  collected  the  votes  from  house  to  house  ;  but 
deacons  in  those  days  were  trustworthy.  After  a  little  a 
man  was  allowed  to  vote  if  a  white  man  and  owned  prop 
erty  to  a  certain  amount,  though  he  did  not  belong  to  the 
church,  and  that  was  the  augmentation  of  suffrage  in 
that  respect.  After  a  time  it  became  necessary  to  knock 
down  even  that  exception.  Franklin  labored  with 
might  and  main  to  this  end,  and  employed  that  signifi 
cant  argument:  If  a  man  may  not  vote  unless  he  is  a 
property-holder  to  the  amount  of  $100,  and  he  owns  an 
ass  which  is  worth  $100,  and  to-day  the  ass 
is  well  and  he  votes,  but  to-morrow  the  ass 
dies,  and  so  he  cannot  vote— which  votes,  the 
ass  or  the  man  1  The  property  qualification  disappeared 
before  this  argument,  and  the  power  of  voting  became 
free.  Then  came  the  question  of  foreigners  voting,  and 
they  were  not  to  be  allowed  to  vote  except  upon  proba 
tion.  Like  many  of  your  fences,  one  rail  after  another 
fell  down,  until  the  fence  was  so  low  that  anything  could 
jump  it  when  it  wanted  to.  and  in  New-York  they 
jump  it  now  quite  easily.  But  the  day  is  coming,  and 
that  very  soon,  in  which  this  pretense  of  limitation  will 
be  thrown  down,  and  every  man  that  means  in  good  faith 
to  settle  here  shall  have  it  proclaimed  to  him,  "  If  you 


wish  to  settle  here  you  shall  have  the  protection  of  thf) 
aws  if  you  undertake  to  be  responsible  for  those  laws." 
[  would  allow  a  man  to  vote  the  very  moment  he  touches 
the  soil. 

The  next  step  was  the  admission  of  the  colored  race  to 
vote.  This  was  the  boldest  thing  ever  done.  It  was  said 
it  was  a  war  measure ;  it  was  necessarily  connected  with 
it  In  such  a  manner  as  to  come  under  that  general  desig 
nation.  During  the  war  a  million  of  black  men  were 
taken  from  the  plantation— they  could  cot  read 
the  Constitution  or  the  spelling-book,  they  could 
hardly  tell  one  hand  from  the  other— and  they 
were  allowed  to  vote,  in  the  sublime  faith 
that  liberty  which  makes  a  man  competent  to 
vote  would  render  him  fit  to  discharge  the  duty  of  the 
voter.  And  when  these  colored  men,  these  unwashed 
black  men  were  allowed  to  vote,  although  much  disturb 
ance  occurred— as  disturbance  always  occurs  upon  great 
changes — I  am  bound  to  say  that  the  black  man  has 
proved  himself  worthy  of  the  trust  confided  to  him.  Be 
fore  emancipation  the  black  man  was  the 
most  docile  laborer  that  ever  the  world  saw. 
During  the  war,  and  when  he  knew  that 
liberty  was  the  gage,  when  he  knew  that  the  battle  waa 
whether  he  should  or  should  not  be  true,  although  the 
country  for  hundreds  of  miles  was  stripped  bare  of  able- 
bodied  white  men,  and  when  property  was  at  the  mercy 
of  the  slave,  arson  or  rapine  or  conspiracy  was  saved  to 
the  country,  and  no  uprising  took  place.  They  stood 
still,  conscious  of  their  power,  and  said :  "  We  will  see 
what  God  will  do  for  us."  Such  a  history  has  no  parallel 
And  since  they  began  to  vote,  after  their  eman 
cipation,  I  beg  to  say,  in  closing  on  this  subject,  that  they 
have  voted  just  as  wisely  and  patriotically  as  did  their 
late  masters  before  emancipation. 

And  now  there  is  but  one  step  more — there  is  but  one 
step  more.  We  permit  the  lame,  the  halt,  and  the  blind 
to  go  the  ballot-box ;  we  permit  the  foreigner  and  the 
black  man,  the  slave  and  the  freedman,  to  partake  of  the 
suffrage ;  there  is  but  one  thing  left  out,  and  that  is  the 
mother  that  taught  us,  and  the  wife  that  is  thought 
worthy  to  walk  side  by  side  with  us.  It  is  woman  that 
is  put  lower  than  the  slave,  lower  than  the  ignorant  for 
eigner.  She  is  put  among  the  paupers  whom  the  law 
won't  allow  to  vote,  among  the  insane  whom 
the  law  won't  allow  to  vote.  But  the  days  are  numbered 
in  which  this  can  take  place,  and  she  too  will  vote.  As 
in  a  hundred  years  suffrage  has  extended  its  bounds 
until  it  now  includes  the  whole  population,  in  another 
hundred  years  everything  will  vote,  unless  it  be  the 
power  of  the  loom,  and  locomotive,  and  watch,  and  I 
sometimes  think,  looking  at  these  machines  and  their 
performances,  that  they  too  ought  to  vote. 


The  Advance  of  a 


V. 


AUGMENTATION  IN  INTELLIGENCE. 

More  than  that,  what  has  been  the  progress  of  the 
country  during  this  time  in  intelligence  and  the 
means  of  intelligence  1  A  hundred  years  ago,  I  had  al 
most  said,  schoolhouses  couW.  be  counted,  certainly 
upon  the  hairs  of  your  head,  if  not  upon  the  fingers  of 
your  hand,  in  New-England  and  throughout  the  country. 
As  I  remember  them,  they  were  miserable,  unpainted 
buildings,  that  roasted  you  in  Winter  and  stunk  in  Sum 
mer,  with  slabs  for  seats,  with  old  Webster  for  the  spell 
ing-book,  with  Daboll  for  the  arithmetic,  with  three 
months  of  school  m  the  Winter,  and  with  one,  two,  or 
three  in  Summer.  Compare  them  with  the  high  schools, 
the  graded  schools,  and  the  primary  schools  that  are  now 
the  pride  of  every  populous  neighborhood.  Has  there 
been  no  augmentation  in  the  instruments  of  intelligence  ? 

Then  there  were  perhaps  20  newspapers  in  the  United 
States.  Alas!  how  they  have  increased  since  then! 
These  are  said  to  be  the  leaves  of  the  tree  for  the  healing 
of  the  nations ;  and  often  in  this  regard  that  comes  to 
pass  which  comes  to  pass  in  sickness— that  men  who 
take  the  leaves  are  made  sicker  than  they  were  before. 
But  every  man  reads  the  newspapers  to-day.  The  dray 
man,  at  his  nooning,  divides  the  time  between  his  little 
tin  kettle  and  his  newspaper.  A  man,  though  he  goes 
home  tired,  yet  must  know  what  the  news  is.  The  vast 
majority  of  laboring  men— not  to  speak  of  professional 
men,  and  men  whose  business  requires  that  they  shall 
read— know  before  the  setting  of  the  sun,  on  any  given 
day,  what  is  being  done  in  Asia,  what  is  being  done  in 
Turkey,  what  is  being  done  in  California,  what  is 
being  done  the  world  around— for  this  is  a  pocket  world 
now,  which  every  man  can  carry  round  for  himself,  in 
his  newspaper.  t 

Consider  how  cheap  books  are.  Consider  how  wide  is 
the  diffusion  of  knowledge  through  essays,  through 
treatises  of  various  kinds,  through  lectures,  through  all 
manner  of  instruments  of  enlightenment.  Consider  how 
our  political  organizations  are  turning  themselves  into 
great  educating  conventions,  in  which  the  best  men  dis 
course  on  their  theories  of  government.  I  hold  that  no 
German  university  ever  had  in  its  halls  such  legists  or 
judicial  men  as  were  turned  out  by  the  wholesale  in  this 
country  during  the  late  war,  and  for  years  preceding 
tiiat  war,  for  the  discussion  of  questions  relating 
to  the  rights  of-  the  individual,  the  nature  of 
the  State,  the  duty  of  the  citizen,  and  the  func 
tions  and  prerogatives  of  the  Legislature  and  the  Gov 
ernment.  Never  were  a  peopie  so  educated  as  this  peo 
ple  were  during  the  twenty-five  years  which  preceded 
the  present.  For,  let  me  tell  you,  in  1776  there  were  29 
public  libraries  in  the  United  States ;  or,  there  were 
about  one  and  two-thirds  volumes  for  each  100  of  the 
people  in  the  country.  In  1876  there  are  3,632  public 


Century— Bceclicr.  41 

libraries  in  the  United  States,  not  including  the 
libraries  of  the  common  schools,  of  the  Church, 
or  the  Sunday-school,  numbering  in  the  ag 
gregate  12,276,000  volumes,  or  about  30  volumes  to 
one  hundred  persons.  Between  1775  and  1800— a  period  of 
twenty-five  years— there  were  20  public  libraries  formed. 
During  another  period  of  twenty-five  years— between 
1800  and  1825— there  were  179  public  libraries  formed. 
During  the  next  period  of  twenty -five  years— between 
1825  and  1850— there  were  551  public  libraries  formed. 
During  the  twenty-five  years  intervening  between  1850 
and  1875,  there  were  2,240  public  libraries  formed.  And 
in  all  the  history  of  America  there  has  not  been  a  period 
when  the  brain  of  the  population  has  teemed  with  such 
fertility  as  it  did  during  the  25  years  last  past,  in  which 
the  great  and  agitating  discussions  of  slavery  took  place. 
During  the  war  when  there  was  such  a  subsoiling  of  this 
country,  there  was  displayed  such  energy  and  activity 
of  its  people  as  they  had  never  before  displayed.  Never 
before  were  there  25  years  in  which  there  were  such 
tremendous  agents  employed  for  instruction  ;  never  be 
fore  were  there  such  instruments  of  enlightenment 
brought  to  bear  upon  us. 

And  that  which  is  indicated  in  the  increase  of  books  is 
carried  out  in  the  increase  of  newspapers  and  maga 
zines  not  only,  but  in  the  increase  of  machinery  and 
agriculture  and  art  and  the  mechanical  business  of  life. 
The  impulse  toward  power  and  fruitfulness  was  never 
s^eminent  as  it  was  during  those  25  years  in  which  the 
rights  of  men  were  the  fundamental  questions  that  were 
discussed,  and  in  which  we  proved  the  sincerity  of  the 
North  and  the  weakness  of  the  South. 

VI. 

EELIGIOUS     INFLUENCE. 

Thus  far  we  have  spoken  of  the  condition  of  the  com 
mon  people  and  their  various  institutions.  Let  me  say 
in  passing  one  word  on  that  subject  which  from  my  very 
profession  it  might  be  thought  that  I  would  mention 
first,  and  which  on  that  very  account  I  only  glance 
at  lest  I  should  seem  to  give  undue  promi 
nence  to  that  profession.  The  state  of  religious 
feeling  in  this  country  is  more  advanced  to-day  by  many 
and  ma  y  degrees  than  it  has  been  in  any  period  anterior 
to  this.  When  the  Ohio  River,  the  mountain  snow  melt 
ing  swells  up  to  the  measure  of  its  banks,  begins  to 
overflow  and  overflow,  the  big  Miami  bottoms  are  one 
sheeted  field  of  water,  and  where  I  once  lived— in 
Lawrenceburg,  Indiana— I  could  take  a  boat  and  go  25 
miles  straight  across  the  country,  so  vast  was  the 
volume.  Now,  suppose  a  man  had  taken  a  skiff  and  gone 
out  over  the  fields  and  plumbed  the  depth  and  found  only 
five  feet  of  water,  and  had  said,  "  Ah !  only  five  feet  of 
water,  and  the  Ohio  had  forty  feet."  Well,  the  Ohio  has 
not  shrunk  one  inch.  There  are  forty  feet  there  and  there 
arc  tive  i'oet  everywhere  else.  Religion  used  to  be  iu  tha 


42 


Independence  Day  C  rations,  July  4,  187G. 


clmrcli  pretty  much  and  men  used  to  have  to  measure 
the  church  in  order  to  know  how  deep  it  was,  but 
there  has  been  rain  on  the  mountains  and  the  moral  feel 
ing  that  exists  in  the  community  and  in  the  world 
has  overflowed  the  bounds  of  the  church,  and  you  can't 
measure. the  religious  life  or  the  religious  impulse  of  this 
people  unless  you  measure  their  philanthropy,  their 
household  virtue,  and  the  general  good  will  that  prevails 
between  classes  and  communities.  The  church  is  not 
less  than  it  has  been,  it  is  more  than  it  ever  was,  but 
outside  of  it  also  there  is  a  vast  volume  of  that 
which  can  be  registered  under  no  head  so  well  as  under 
that  of  religious  influence,  which  never  existed  in  old 
days  gone  by  to  the  extent  to  which  it  exists  now.  I  am 
one  who,  although  I  am  a  servant  of  the  Church,  a  min 
ister  within  her  bounds,  whenever  I  look  out  of  her  win 
dows  and  see  hundreds  of  good  men  outside,  am  not 
sorry.  I  thank  God  when  I  see  a  better  man  in  a  denom 
ination  that  is  not  my  own  than  I  see  in  my  own  denom 
ination.  I  thank  God  when  I  see  virtue  and  true  piety 
existing  outside  of  the  church,  as  well  as  when  I  see  it 
existing  inside  of  the  church.  I  recognize  the  hand  of 
God  as  being  as  bountiful,  and  I  recognize  His  admin 
istration  as  being  as  broad,  as  are  the  rains  or  as  is  the 
sunshine.  God  does  not  send  to  Pj^kskill  just  as  much 
sunshine  as  you  want  for  your  corn  and  rye  and  wheat. 
It  shines  on  stones  and  sticks  and  worms  and  bugs.  It 
pours  its  light  and  heat  down  upon  the  mountains  and 
rocks  and  everywhere.  God  rains  not  by  the  pint  yr 
by  the  quart,  but  by  the  continent.  Whether  things 
need  it  or  not,  He  needs  to  pour  out  His  bounty,  t|hat  He 
may  relieve  Himself  of  His  infinite  fullness. 

And  so  it  is  in  the  community.  Never  before  was  there 
fco  much  conscience  or  so  many  subjects  as  there  is 
to-day.  I  know  there  is  not  enough  conscience  to  go 
around  always.  I  know  there  are  men  whose  consciences 
are  infirm  on  certain  sides.  I  know  that  in  the  various 
professions  there  are  many  places  where  there  are  gaps, 
or  where  the  walls  are  too  low.  But  the  cultivation  of 
conscience  is  an  art.  Conscience  is  a  thing  that  is 
learned.  No  man  has  much  more  conscience  than  he  is 
trained  to.  So  the  minister  has  his  conscience  ;  it  is  ac 
cording  to  the  training  that  he  has  had  ;  and  it  is  thought 
to  be  fair  for  him  to  hunt  a  brother  minister  for  heresy, 
though  it  would  not  be  fair  for  him  to  hunt  him  for  any 
thing  else.  A  lawyer  has  his  conscience.  It  is  sometimes 
very  high,  and  sometimes  it  is  very  low.  As  an  average, 
it  is  very  good.  The  doctor  has  his  conscience,  and  his 
patients  have  theirs.  Everybody  has  his  conscience,  and 
everybody's  conscience  acts  according  to  certain  lines  to 
which  he  has  been  drilled  and  trained.  Right  and  wrong 
are  to  the  great  mass  of  men  as  letters  and  words.  We 
learn  how  to  spell,  and  if  a  man  spells  wrong,  and  was 
taught  in  that  way,  nevertheless  it  is  his  way  of  spelling. 
And  so  it  is  with  men's  consciences.  Now,  I  aver  that 
more  legislative  conscience  is  genius.  Not  one  man  in  a 


million  has  a  sense  of  what  is  right  and  wrong  except  as 
the  result  of  education  and'  experience.  No  man  in  com 
plex  circumstances  has  a  conception  ot  justice  and  recti 
tude  by  a  legislative  conscience.  The  great  mass  of  men 
—teachers  and  the  taught — are  obliged  to  depend  upon 
the  revelations  of  experience  to  enable  them  to  deter 
mine  what  is  right  and  wrong.  They  have  to  set  their 
consciences  by  the  rule  of  the  experiences  which  they 
have  gone  through. 

Now  I  aver  not  that  the  conscience  of  this  people  is  a 
perfect  conscience  and  not  that  it  does  not  need  a  great 
deal  of  education,  but  that,  such  as  it  is,  it  is  better  and 
higher  and  more  universal  than  it  was  at  any  other  pe 
riod  of  the  hundred  years  that  have  just  gone  by.  I 
would  rather  trust  the  moral  sentiment  of  the  commu 
nity  now  on  any  question  of  domestic  policy,  or  on  any 
question  of  legislative  policy,  than  at  any  period  anterior 
in  the  history  of  America.  I  would,  within  the  bounds 
of  their  knowledge,  rather  trust  the  moral  judgment  and 
common  sense  of  the  millions  of  the  conwnon  people  than 
the  special  knowledge  of  any  hundred  of  the  best 
trained  geniuses  that  there  are  in  the  land. 
This  is  not  true  in  respect  to  those  departments  of 
knowledge  which  the  common  people  have  never  reached. 
There  is  no  common  sense  in  astronomy,  because  there 
is  no  common  knowledge  in  astronomy.  The  same  is 
also  true  of  engineering ;  but  in  that  whole  vast  realm  of 
questions  which  do  coaae  down  to  men's  board  and 
bosoms,  the  moral  sentiment  of  the  great  mass  of  the 
common  people  is  more  reliable  than  the  judgment  of 
the  few.  In  all  those  questions  there  is  a  common  con 
science  and  a  common  moral  sense ;  and  I  say  that  the 
average  moral  sense  and  conscience  of  the  community 
never  were  so  high  as  they  are  to-day— and  to-day  at  such; 
a  hight  in  the  common  people  as  to  be  safer  in  them  than 
,  in  any  class  in  the  community.  This  is  a  great  gain  in 
the  last  bu/idred  years. 

VII, 
THE  COUNTRY'S  ELEMENTS  Or  GROWTH. 

Let  me  once  more  call  vour  attention  to  some  of  the 
elements  of  growth  that  have  taken  place  in  this  nation. 
I  was  one  of  those  whose  courage  never  failed  except  in 
spots.  Before  the  war  I  did  have  some  dsrk  days,  ia 
which  I  felt  as  though  this  nation  was  going  to  be  raised 
up  merely  to  be  the  manure  of  some  after  nation,  being 
plowed  under.  It  seemed  to  me  as  though  all  the  avenues 
of  power  were  in  the  hands  of  despotism,  as  though 
a  great  part  of  humanity  was  trodden  under  foot ;  as 
though  every  element  that  could  secure  to  despotism  a 
continuance  of  its  power  had  been  seized  and  sealed ;  and 
I  did  not  see  any  way  out— God  forgive  me— for  those 
very  steps  which  made  the  power  and  despotism  of 
Slavery  dangerous  were  in  the  end  its  remedy  ant!  its  de 
struction.  And  this  great  North  had  so  long,  partly  from 
necessity,  and  partly  from  a  misguided  and  romantic 
••»,tiiotism,'  encouraged  and  promoted  that  which  waa 


Tlie  Advance  of  a  Century — Beecher. 


the  caries  of  free  institution.0,  the  bane  of  liberty,  and  the 
danger  which  threatened  the  continent  in  all  after  times. 

But  when  at  last  the  nation  was  aroused,  it  smote  not 
once,  nor  twice,  but,  according  to  the  old  prophet,  seven 
times ;  and  then  deliverance  was  prompt.  The  power 
of  a  nation  is  to  be  judged  by  its  resistance  to  disease. 
All  nations  are  liable  to  attack,  but  the  real  power  of  a 
nation  is  shown  in  its  ability  to  throw  off  disease— in  its 
resiliency.  The  power  of  recovery  is  better  than  all 
soundness  of  national  constitution.  It  is  better  than 
anything  else  can  be.  America  has  arisen  from  a  fifth- 
rate  power  ;  but  she  looks  calmly  and  modestly  over  the 
ocean,  and  is  a  first-rate  power  among  the  nations  to 
day.  She  was  a  democracy  ;  the  people  made  their  own 
laws  ;  they  levied  and  collected  their  own  taxes  ;  and  it 
was  said,  "  Of  course  they  will  not  allow  themselves  to  be 
taxed  more  than  they  want  to  be."  They  were  not  a 
military  people ;  Europe  told  us  so.  Great  Britain  told 
us  so.  They  told  me  so  to  my  face ;  and  I  said,  on  many 
a  platform,  with  an  audience  like  this,  "  You  do  not  un- 
dertsand  what  democratic  liberty  means.  Wait  till  this 
game  is  played  ont,  and  see  what  the  issue  Is."  And 
what  is  the  issue  of  the  game  ?  To  a  certain  extent,  the 
political  economy  of  the  South  gave  her  aid  in  the  be 
ginning;  and  the  political  economy  of  the  North  gave 
her  inexhaustible  resources.  The  genius  of  the  Northern 
people  is  slow  to  get  on  fire,  and  is  hard  to  put  out ;  so 
that  we  had  to  learn  the  trade  of  war.  We  had  learned 
every  trade  of  peace  already,  but  when  once  we  had 
learned  the  trade  of  war,  the  power  of  the  North  was 
manifest,  to  the  honor  and  glory  of  OUT  religion,  of  our 
political  faiths,  and  of  the  whole  training  of  our  past 
history. 

But  there  was  something  more  dangerous  than  war. 
An  insidious  serpent  is  more  dangerous  than  a  roaring 
lion — if  the  lion  does  not  jump  before  he  roars.  Repudi 
ation  threatened  more  damnation  to  the  morals  of  this 
nation  than  ever  war  did  with  all  its  mischiefs ;  and  I 
want  to  record,  to  the  honor  of  our  foreign  population, 
of  whom  it  is  often  said,  "  When  you  come  to  a  great 
stress,  when  questions  are  to  be  settled  on  principles  of 
rectitude  and  truth,  they  will  be  found  wanting  "—I 
want  to  record  to  the  honor  of  the  population  that  we 
have  borrowed  from  Europe,  the  fact  that  when  the 
question  came,  "Shall  this  nation  pay  every  dollar 
which  it  promised,  and  by  which  it  put  the  boys  in  blue 
in  the  field,"  it  was,  through  the  West  and  the  North- 
West,  the  foreign  vote  together  with  the  vote  of  our  own 
people,  that  carried  the  day  for  honesty  and  for  public 
integrity.  Now,  for  a  Democratic  nation  that  owns 
everything— the  government,  the  law,  the  policy,  the 
magistrate,  the  ruler;  that  can  change,  that  caa  make 
and  unmake,  that  has  in  its  hands  almost  the  power  of  the 
Highest  to  exult  one  and  to  put  down  another— for  such 
a  nation  to  stand  before  the  world  and  show  that  this 
great  people,  smarming  through  our  valleys  and  over 


our  mountains  and  far  away  to  either  shore,  and  without 
tiie  continuity  necessary  to  the  creation  of  a  common 
public  sentiment,  were  willing  to  bear  the  brunt  of  a  five 
years'  war  and  to  be  severely  taxed,  down  to  this  day, 
and  yet  refuse  to  lighten  its  burdens  in  a  way  that  would 
be  wrong  and  dishonorable— that  will  weigh  more  in 
Europe  than  any  test  that  any  nation  is  able  to  put  forth, 
for  its  honor,  its  integrity,  its  strength,  and  its  promise 
of  future  life. 

Look  back,  then,  through  the  hundred  years  of  our 
national  history.  They  are  to  me  like  the  ascending  of 
stairs,  some  of  which  are  broader,  some  narrower,  some 
with  higher  rising,  and  some  with  less  than  the  others, 
but  on  the  whole  there  has  been  a  steady  ascent  in  in 
telligence,  in  conscience,  in  purity,  in  industry,  in  hap 
piness,  in  the  art  of  living  well  individually,  and  in 
the  higher  art  of  living  well  collectively,  and  we  stand 
to-day  higher  than  at  any  other  time.  Our  burdens  are 
flea-bites.  We  have  some  trouble  about  money.  I  never 
saw  a  time  when  the  most  of  the  population  did  not.  We  * 
have  our  trouble,  because  there  is  loo  much  in  some 
places  and  too  little  in  others,  The  trouble  with  us  is 
like  the  trouble  in  Winter,  when  the  snow  has  fallen  and 
drifted,  and  leaves  one-half  of  the  road  bare,  while  it  ia 
piled  up  in  the  other  half,  so  that  you  cannot  get  along 
for  the  much  nor  for  the  little.  But  a  distribution  will 
speedily  bring  all  things  right — and  I  think  we  are  not 
far  from  the  time  when  th,at  will  take  place.  So  soon  as 
we  can  touch  the  ground  of  universal  confidenee,  so  soon 
as  we  stand  on  a  basis  of  silver  and  gold— then,  and  not 
an  hour  before  then,  will  this  nation  begin  to  move  on  in 
the  old  prosperity  of  business. 

I  determined  not  to  say  anything  that  could  be  con 
strued  as  an  illusion  to  party  politics,  and  what  I  have 
said  cannot  be  so  construed,  for  both  sides  around  here 
say  that  they  are  for  resumption.  The  only  difference  is> 
that  one  party  say  that  they  are  for  resumption,  and 
the  other  say  that  they  are  for  resumption  as  soon  a» 
we  can  have  it.  Well,  I  do  not  see  how  anybody  can  say 
anything  more.  You  cannot  resume  before  you  can. 

Fellow  citizens,  in  looking  back  upon  the  past,  it  is 
not  right  that  we  should  leave  the  sphere  and  field  of 
our  remarks  without  one  glance  at  the  future.  In 
another  hundred  years  not  one  of  us  will  be  here.  Some 
other  speaker,  doubtless,  will  stand  in  my  place.  Other 
hearers  will  throng— though  not  with  more  courtesy,  nor 
with  more  kindly  patience  than  you  have— to  listen  to 
his  speech.  Then  on  every  eminence  from  New-York  to 
Albany  there  will  be  mansions  and  cottages,  and  garden 
will  touch  garden  along  the  whole  Eden  of  the  Hudson 
River  Valley.  But  it  does  not  matter  so  much  to  us,, 
who  come  and  go,  or  what  takes  place  in  the  future,  ex 
cept  so  far  as  our  influence  is  concerned.  When  a  hun 
dred  years  hence  the  untelling  sun,  that  saw  Arnold,  and 
Andre,  and  Washington,  but  will  not  tell  us  one  word 
of  history,  shall  shine  on  these  enchanted  hills  and  on* 


44 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4.  1876. 


tliis  unchanging  river— then  it  is  for  us  to  have  set  in 
motion,  or  to  have  given  renewed  impulse  to  those  great 
causes,  intellectual,  moral,  social,  and  political,  Avhich 
have  rolled  our  prosperity  to  such  a  hight. 

To  every  young  man  here  that  is  beginning  life,  let  me 
gay,  Listen  not  to  those  insidious  teachers  who  tell  you 
that  patriotism  is  a  sham,  and  that  all  public  men  are 
corrupt  or  corrupters.  Men  in  public  or  private  life  are 
corrupt  here  and  there,  but  let  me  say  to  you,  no  corrup 
tion  in  government  would  be  half  so  bad  as  to  have  the 
seeds  of  unbelief  in  public  administration  sown  in  the 
minds  of  the  young.  If  you  teach  the  young  that 
their  Chief  Magistrates,  their  Cabinets,  and  their 
representatives  are  of  course  corrupt,  what  will 

that  be  but  to  teach  them  to  be  themselves  corrupt  ?    I 

> 
stand  hear  to  bear  witness  and  say  that  publicity  may 

•consist  with  virtue  and  does.  There  are  men  that  serve 
the  public  for  the  public,  though  they  themselves  thrive 
4>y  it  also.  I  would  sow  in  your  minds  a  romance  of 


patriotism  and  love  of  country  that  shall  be  necessary  to 
the  love  which  you  have  lor  your  own  households,  and  I 
would  say  to  every  mother  that  teaches  her  child  to 
pray,  next  to  the  petition,  "  Our  Father  which  art  in 
heaven,"  let  it  learn  this  petition  :  Our  Fatherland,  and 
so  let  our  children  grow  up  to  love  God,  to  love  man,  and  to 
love  their  country,  and  to  be  glad  to  serve  their  country  as 
well  as  their  God  and  their  fellow-men,  though  it  may  be 
necessary  that  theys  hould  lay  down  their  lives  to  serve  it. 
T  honor  the  unknown  ones  that  used  to  walk  in  Peeks- 
kill  and  who  fell  in  battle.  I  honor,  too,  every  armlesa 
man,  every  limping  soldier,  that  through  patriotism  went 
to  the  battle-field  and  came  back  lame  and  crippled,  and 
bears  manfully  and  heroically  his  deprivation.  What 
though  he  find  no  occupation  1  What  though  he  be  for 
gotten  1  He  has  in  him  the  imperishable  sweetness  of 
this  thought :  •'  I  did  it  for  my  country's  sake."  For 
God's  sake  and  for  your  country's  sake,  live,  and  you 
shall  live  forever. 


A    CENTURY     OF     SELF-GOVERNMENT. 


THE  HON.  ROBERT  C.  WINTHROP  AT  BOSTON,  MASS. 


I. 

Again  and  again,  Mr.  Mayor  and  Fellow-Cit 
izens,  in  years  gone  by,  considerations  or  circumstances 
of  some  sort,  public  or  private— I  know  not  what— have 
prevented  my  acceptance  of  most  kind  and  flattering  in 
vitations  to  deliver  the  oration  in  this  my  native  city  on 
the  Fourth  of  July.  On  one  of  those  occasions,  long, 
long  ago,  I  am  Bald  to  have  playfully  replied  to  the 
Mayor  of  that  period,  that,  if  I  lived  to  witness  this  Cen 
tennial  anniversary,  I  would  not  refuse  any  service 
which  might  be  required  of  me.  That  pledge  has  been 
recalled  by  others,  if  not  remembered  by  myself,  and  by 
the  grace  of  God  I  am  here  to-day  to  fulfill  it.  I  have 
come  at  last,  in  obedience  to  your  call,  to  add  my  name 
to  the  distinguished  roll  of  those  who  have  discharged 
this  service  in  unbroken  succession  since  the  year  1783, 
when  the  date  of  a  glorious  act  of  patriots  was  substi 
tuted  for  that  of  a  dastardly  deed  of  hirelings— the  4th 
of  July  for  the  5th  of  March— as  a  day  of  annual  cele 
bration  by  the  people  of  Boston. 

In  rising  to  redeem  the  promise  thus  inconsiderately 
given,  I  may  be  pardoned  for  not  forgetting,  at  the  out 
set,  who  presided  over  the  Executive  Council  of  Massa 
chusetts  when  the  Declaration,  which  has  just  been 
read,  was  first  formally  and  solemnly  proclaimed  to  the 
people,  from  the  balcony  of  yonder  Old  State  House,  on 


the  18th  of  July,  1776 ;  and  whose  privilege  it  was 
amid  the  shoutings  of  the  assembled  multitude,  the  ring 
ing  of  the  bells,  the  salutes  of  the  surrounding  forts,  and 
the  firing  of  13  volleys  from  13  successive  divisions  of 
the  Continental  regiments,  drawn  up  "  in  correspondence 
with  the  number  of  the  American  States  United,"  to  in 
voke  "  Stability  and  Perpetuity  to  American  Independ 
ence  !  God  save  our  American  States ! " 

That  invocation  was  not  in  vain.  That  wish,  that 
prayer,  has  been  graciously  granted.  We  are  here  this 
day  to  thank  God  for  it.  We  do  thank  God  for  it  with  all 
our  hearts,  and  ascribe  to  Him  all  the  glory.  And  it 
would  be  unnatural  if  I  did  not  feel  a  more  than  common 
sat  «wf action,  that  the  privilege  of  giving  expression  to 
your  emotions  of  joy  and  gratitude  at  this  hour  should 
have  been  assigned  to  the  oldest  living  descendant  of  him 
by  whom  that  invocation  was  uttered  and  that  prayer 
breathed  up  to  heaven. 

And  if,  indeed,  in  addition  to  this— as  you,  Mr.  Mayor, 
so  kindly  urged  in  originally  inviting  me— the  name  I 
bear  may  serve  in  any  sort  as  a  link  between  the  earliest 
settlement  of  New-England,  two  centuries  and  a  half 
ago,  and  the  grand  culmination  of  that  settlement  in  this 
Centennial  epoch  in  American  independence,  all  the  less 
may  I  be  at  liberty  to  express  anything  of  the  compunc- 
ion  or  regret,  which  I  cannot  but  sincerely  feel,  that  so 


A  Century  of  Self-Government.— Wlnthrop. 


45 


responsible  and  difficult  a  task  liad  not  been  imposed 
upon  some  more  sufficient  or  certainly  upon  some  younger 
man. 

Yet  what  can  I  say  1  What  can  any  one  say,  here  or 
elsewhere,  to-day,  which  shall  either  satisfy  the  expecta 
tions  of  others,  or  meet  his  own  sense  of  the  demands  of 
such  an  occasion  1  For  myself,  certainly,  the  longer  I 
have  contemplated  it— the  more  deeply  I  have  reflected 
on  it — so  much  the  more  hopeless  I  have  become  of  find 
ing  myself  able  to  give  any  adequate  expression  to  its 
full  significance,  its  real  sublimity  and  grandeur.  A 
hundred-fold  more  than  when  John  Adams  wrote  to  his 
wife  it  would  be  so  forever,  it  is  an  occasion  for  "  shows, 
games,  sports,  guns,  bells,  bonfires,  and  illuminations, 
from  one  end  of  the' continent  to  the  other."  Ovations, 
rather  than  orations,  are  the  order  of  such  a  day  as  this. 
Emotions  like  those  which  ought  to  fill,  and  which  do 
fill,  all  our  hearts,  call  for  the  swelling  tones  of  a  multi 
tude,  the  cheers  of  a  mighty  crowd,  and  refuse  to  be 
utteied  by  any  single  human  voice.  The  strongest 
phrases  seem  feeble  and  powerless ;  the  best  results  of 
historical  research  have  the  dryuess  of  chaff  and  husks, 
and  the  richest  flowers  of  rhetoric  the  drowsiness  of 
"  poppy  or  mandragora,"  in  presence  of  the  simplest 
statement  of  the  grand  consummation  we  are  here  to  cel 
ebrate—a  century  of  self-government  completed!  A 
hundred  years  of  free  republican  institutions  realized 
and  rounded  out !  An  era  of  popular  liberty,  continued 
and  prolonged  from  generation  to  generation,  until  to 
day  it  assumes  its  full  proportions,  and  asserts  its  right 
ful  place,  among  the  ages !  It  is  a  theme  from  which  an 
Everett,  a  Choate,  or  even  a  Webster  might  have  shrunk. 
But  those  voices,  alas !  were  hushed  long  ago.  It  is  a 
theme  on  which  any  one,  living  or  dead,  might  have  been 
glad  to  follow  the  precedent  of  those  few  incomparable 
sentences  at  Gettysburg,  on  the  19th  of  November,  1863, 
and  forbear  from  all  attempt  at  extended  discourse.  It 
is  not  for  me,  however,  to  copy  that  unique  original — nor 
yet  to  shelter  myself  under  an  example,  which  I  should 
in  vain  aspire  to  equal. 

And  indeed,  fellow-citizens,  some  formal  words  must 
be  spoken  here  to-day — trite,  familiar,  commonplace 
words  though  they  may  be— some  words  of  comrnein- 
oral'on;  some  words  of  congratulation ;  some  words  of 
glory  to  God,  and  of  acknowledgment  to  man ;  some 
grateful  lockings  back ;  some  hopeful,  trustful  lookings 
forward— these,  I  am  sensible,  cannot  be  spared  from  our 
great  assembly  on  this  Centennial  Day.  You  would  not 
pardon  me  for  omitting  them.  But  where  shall  I  begin  ? 
To  what  sp-cific  subject  shall  I  turn  for  refuge  from  the 
thousand  thoughts  which  come  crowding  to  one's  mind 
and  rushing  to  one's  lips,  all  jealous  of  postponement,  all 
clamoring  for  ulterauce  before  our  Festival  shall  close, 
and  bef;>r6  this  Centennial  sun  shall  set?  The  single, 
simple  act  which  has  made  the  Fourth  of  July  memora 
ble  fere \'^r — Ute  more  scene  oi  the  Declaration — would 


of  itself  and  alone  supply  an  ample  subject  for  far  more 
than  the  little  hour  which  I  may  dare  to  occupy ;  and, 
though  it  has  been  described  a  hundred  times  before,  in 
histories  and  addresses,  and  in  countless  magazines  and 
journals,  it  imperatively  demands  something  mo  re  than 
a  cursory  allusion  here  to-day,  and  challenges  our  atten 
tion  as  it  never  did  before,  and  hardly  ever  can  challenge 
it  again. 

II. 
JEFFERSON. 

Go  back  with  me,  then,  for  a  few  moments  at  least,  to 
that  great  year  of  our  Lord,  and  that  great  day  of  Amer 
ican  Liberty.  Transport  yourselves  with  me,  in  imagina 
tion,  to  Philadelphia.  It  will  require  but  little  effort  for 
any  of  us  to  do  so,  for  all  our  hearts  are  there  already. 
Yes,  we  are  all  there— from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific, 
from  the  Lakes  to  the  Gulf,— we  are  all  there,  at  this 
high  noon  of  our  Nation's  birthday,  and  that  beautiful 
City  of  Brotherly  Love,  rejoicing  in  all  her  brilliant  dis 
plays,  and  partaking  of  the  full  enjoyment  of  all  her 
pageantry  and  pride.  Certainly,  the  birthplace  and  the 
burial-place  of  Franklin  are  in  cordial  sympathy  at  this 
hour;  and  a  common  sentiment  of  congratulation  and 
joy,  leaping  and  vibrating  from  heart  to  heart,  outstrips 
even  the  magic  swiftness  of  magnetic  wires.  There  are 
no  chords  of  such  elastic  reach  and  such  elastic  power  as 
the  heartstrings  of  a  mighty  nation,  touched  and  tuned, 
as  all  our  heartstrings  are  to-day,  to  the  sense  of  a  com 
mon  glory— throbbing  and  thrilling  with  a  common  ex 
ultation. 

Go  with  me,  then,  I  say,  to  Philadelphia;— not  to  Phila 
delphia,  indeed,  as  she  is  at  this  moment,  with  all  her 
bravery  on,  with  all  her  beautiful  garments  around  her,, 
with  all  the  graceful  and  generous  contributions  which 
so  many  other  cities  and  other  States  and  other  Nations 
have  sent  for  adornment  —  not  forgetting  those  most 
graceful,  most  welcome,  most  touching  contributions,  in 
view  of  the  precise  character  of  the  occasion,  from  Old 
England  herself ;-  -but  go  with  me  to  Philadelphia  as  she 
was  just  a  hundred  years  ago.  Enter  with  me  her  noble 
Independence  Hall,  so  happily  restored  and  consecrated 
afresh  as  the  Runnymede  of  our  Nation ;  and,  as  we  enter 
it,  let  us  not  forget  to  be  grateful  that  no  demands  of 
public  convenience  or  expediency  have  called  for  the 
demolition  of  that  old  State  House  of  Pennsylvania.  Ob 
serve  and  watch  the  movements,  listen  attentively  to  the 
words,  look  steadfastly  at  the  countenances,  of  the  men 
who  compose  the  little  Congress  assembled  there.  Braver, 
wiser,  no  bier  men  have  never  been  gathered  and  grouped 
under  a  single  roof,  before  or  since,  in  any  age,  or  any 
soil  beneath  the  sun.  What  are  they  doing  ?  What  are 
they  daring?  Who  are  they,  thus  to  do,  and  thus  to 
dare  ? 

Single  out  with  me,  as  you  easily  will  at  the  first 
glance,  by  a  presence  and  a  stature  not  easily  overlooked 
or  mistaken,  the  young,  ardent,  accomplished  Jefferson* 


46 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


He  is  only  just  33  years  of  age.  Charming  in  conversa 
tion,  ready  and  full  in  counsel,  he  is  "  slow  of  tongue," 
like  the  great  Lawgiver  of  the  Israelites,  for  any  public 
discussion  or  formal  discourse.  But  he  has  brought  with 
him  the  reputation  of  wielding  what  John  Adams  well 
called  "a  masterly  pen."  And  grandly  has  he  j  ustified 
that  reputation.  Grandly  has  he  employed  that  pen 
already  in  drafting  a  paper  which  is  at  this  moment 
lying  on  the  table,  and  awaiting  its  final  signature  and 
sanction. 

Three  weeks  before,  indeed— on  the  previous  7th  of 
June— his  own  noble  colleague,  Richard  Henry  Lee,  had 
moved  the  resolution,  whose  adoption  on  the  2d  of  July 
liad  virtually  settled  the  whole  question.  Nothing,  cer 
tainly,  more  explicit  or  emphatic  could  have  been 
wanted  for  that  Congress  than  that  resolution,  setting 
forth,  as  it  did,  in  language  of  striking  simplicity  and 
brevity  and  dignity,  "  That  these  United  Colonies  are, 
and,  of  right,  ought  to  be,  Free  and  Independent  States  ; 
that  they  are  absolved  from  all  allegiance  to  the  British 
Crown,  and  that  all  connection  between  them  and  the 
State  of  Great  Britain  is  and  ought  to  be  totally  dis 
solved." 

The  resolution  was,  indeed,  not  only  comprehensive 
and  conclusive  enough  for  the  Congress  which  adopted 
it,  but,  I  need  not  say,  it  is  comprehensive  and  conclu 
sive  enough  for  us  ;  and  I  heartily  wish  that,  in  the  cen 
tury  to  come,  its  reading  might  be  substituted  for  that  of 
the  longer  Declaration,  which  has  put  the  patience  of  our 
audiences  to  so  severe  a  test  for  so  many  years  past,  if 
not  to  day. 

But  the  form  in  which  that  resolution  was  to  be  an 
nounced  and  proclaimed  to  the  people  of  the  colonies, 
and  the  reasons  by  which  it  was  to  be  justified  before  the 
world,  were  at  that  time  of  intense  interest  and  of  mo 
mentous  importance.  No  graver  responsibility  was  ever 
devolved  upon  a  young  man  of  33,  if,  indeed,  upon  any 
man  of  any  age,  than  that  of  preparing  such  a  paper.  As 
often  as  I  have  examined  the  original  draft  of  that 
paper,  still  extant  in  the  archives  of  the  State  Depart 
ment  at  Washington,  and  have  observed  how  very  few 
changes  were  made,  or  even  suggested,  by  the  illustrious 
men  associated  with  its  author  on  the  committee  for  its 
preparation,  it  has  seemed  to  me  to  be  as  marvelous  a 
composition,  of  its  kind.and  for 'its  purpose,  as  the  annals 
of  mankind  cavi  show.  The  earliest  honors  of  this  day 
certainly  may  well  be  paid,  here  and  throughout  the 
country,  to  the  young  Virginian  of  "  the  masterly  pen." 

And  here,  by  the  favor  of  a  highly  valued  friend  and 
fellow-citizen,  to  whom  it  was  given  by  Jefferson  himself 
a  few  months  only  before  his  death,  I  am  privileged  to 
hold  in  my  hands  and  to  lift  up  to  the  eager  gaze  of  you 
sll,  a  most  compact  and  convenient  little  mahogany  case, 
•which  bears  this  autograph  inscription  on  its  face,  dated 
"  Monticcllo,  November  18,  1825  :•" 

"T'~"~w  J-ff"' fl    •-••—•  tliis  Writfn-?  D?slt  to  Joseph 


Coolidge,  Junr.,  as  a  memorial  of  his  affection.  It  was 
made  from  a  drawing  of  his  own,  by  Ben  Randall,  Cab 
inet-maker  of  Philadelphia,  with  whom  he  first  lodged 
on  his  arrival  in  that  City  in  May,  1776,  and  is  the 
identical  one  on  which  he  wrote  the  Declaration  of 
Independence." 

"  Politics,  as  well  as  Religion,"  the  inscription  pro 
ceeds  to  say,  "  has  its  superstitions.  These,  gaining 
strength  with  time,  may,  one  day,  give  imaginary  value 
to  this  relic,  for  its  association  with  the  birth  of  the  Great 
Charter  of  our  Independence." 

Superstitions !  Imaginary  value  !  Not  for  an  instant 
can  we  admit  such  ideas.  The  modesty  of  the  writer  has 
betrayed  even  "  the  masterly  pen."  There  is  no  imagin 
ary  value  to  this  relic,  and  no  superstition  is  required 
to  render  it  as  precious  and  as  priceless  a  piece  of 
wood,  as  the  secular  cabinets  of  the  \v  orld  have  ever 
possessed,  or  ever  claimed  to  possess.  No  cabinet 
maker  on  earth  will  have  a  more  enduring  name  than 
this  inscription  has  secured  to  "  Ben  Randall  of  Phila 
delphia."  No  pen  will  have  a  wider  or  more  lasting 
fame  than  his  who  wrote  the  inscription.  The  very  table 
at  Runny mede,  which  some  of  us  have  seen,  on  which 
the  Magna  Charta  of  England  is  said  to  have  been  signed 
or  sealed  five  centuries  and  a  half  before— even  were  it 
authenticated  by  the  genuine  autographs  of  every  one  of 
those  brave  old  Barons,  with  Stephen  Langton  at  their 
head— who  extorted  its  grand  pledges  and  promises  from 
King  John — so  soon  to  be  violated — could  hardly  exceed, 
could  hardly  equal,  in  interest  and  value,  this  little 
mahogany  desk.  May  it  long  find  its  appropriate  and 
appreciating  ownership  in  the  successive  generations  of 
a  family  in  which  the  blood  of  Virginia  and  Massachu 
setts  are  so  auspiciously  commingled! 

But  the  young  Jefferson  is  not  alone  from  Virginia,  on 
the  day  we  are  celebrating,  in  the  Hall  which  we  have 
entered  as  imaginary  spectators  of  the  scene.  His  veu- 
erated  friend  and  old  legal  preceptor— George  Wythe— is, 
indeed,  temporarily  absent  from  his  side;  and  even 
Richard  Henry  Lee,  the  original  mover  of  the  measure, 
and  upon  whom  it  might  have  devolved  to  draw  up  the 
Declaration,  has  been  called  home  by  dangerous  illness 
in  his  family,  and  is  not  there  to  help  him.  But  "  the  gay, 
good-humored "  Francis  •  Lightfoot  Lee,  a  younger 
brother,  is  there.  Benjamin  Harrison,  the  father  of  our 
late  President  Harrison,  is  there,  and  has  just  reported 
the  Declaration  from  the  Committee  of  the  Whole,  of 
which  he  was  Chairman.  The  "  mil  I  and  philanthropic  " 
Carter  Braxton  is  there,  in  the  place  of  the  lamented  Pey 
ton  Randolph,  the  first  President  of  the  Continental  Con 
gress,  who  had  died,  to  the  sorrow  of  the  whole  country, 
six  or  seven  months  before.  And  the  noble-hearted 
Thomas  Nelson  is  there— the  largest  subscriber  to  the 
generous  relief  from  Virginia  to  Boston  during  the  sore 
distress  occasioned  by  the  shutting  up  of  our  port,  and 
who  was  the  mover  of  tliose  Instructions  in  the  Con  veil- 


A  Century  of  Self -Government — Winthrop. 


47 


tion  of  Virginia,  passed  on  the  15th  of  May,  under  which 
Richard  Henry  Lee  offered  the  original  Resolution  of  In 
dependence,  on  the  7th  of  June. 

I  am  particular,  fellow-citizens,  in  giving  to  the  Old 
Dominion  the  foremost  place  in  this  rapid  survey  of  the 
Fourth  of  July,  1776,  and  in  naming  every  one  of  her 
delegates  who  participated  in  that  day's  doings;  for  it  is 
hardly  too  much  to  say  that  the  destinies  of  our  coun 
try,  at  that  period,  hung  and  hinged  upon  her  action, 
and  upon  the  actions  of  her  great  and  glorious  sons. 
Without  Virginia,  as  we  must  all  acknowledge— without 
her  Patrick  Henry  among  the  people,  her  Lees  and  Jef 
ferson  in  the  forum,  and  her  Washington  in  the  field— I 
will  not  say  that  the  cause  of  American  Liberty  and 
American  Independence  must  have  been  ultimately  de 
feated—no,  no ;  there  was  no  ultimate  defeat  for  that 
cause  in  the  decrees  of  the  Most  High ! — but  it  must  have 
been  delayed,  postponed,  perplexed,  and  to  many  eyes 
;and  many  hearts  rendered  seemingly  hopeless.  It  was 
Union  iv*iich  assured  our  independence,  and  there  could 
have  been  no  Union  without  the  influence  and  coopera 
tion  of  that^reat  leading  Southern  Colony.  To-day, 
then,  as  we  look  back  over  the  wide  gulf  of  a  century, 
we  are  ready  and  glad  to  forget  everything  of  alienation, 
everything  of  contention  and  estrangement  which  has 
intervened,  and  to  hail  her  once  more,  as  our  Fathers  in 
Faneull  Hall  hailed  her  in  1775,  as  "  our  noble,  patriotic 
sister  Colony,  Virginia." 

I  may  not  attempt,  on  this  occasion,  to  speak  with 
equal  particularity  of  all  the  other  delegates  whom  we 
see  assembled  in  that  immoratal  Congress.  Their  names 
are  all  inscribed  where  they  can  never  be  obliterated, 
never  be  forgotten.  Yet  some  others  of  them  so  chal 
lenge  our  attention  and  rivet  our  gaze,  as  we  look  in 
upon  that  old,  time-honored  Hall,  that  I  cannot  pass  to 
other  topics  without  a  brief  allusion  to  them. 

III. 
SHERMAN  AND  HANCOCK.  , 

Who  can  overlook  or  mistake  the  sturdy  front  of  Roger 
Sherman,  whom  we  are  proud  to  recall  as  a  native  of 
Massachusetts,  though  now  a  delegate  from  Connecti 
cut,— that  "  Old  Puritan,"  as  John  Adams  well  said,  "  as 
honest  as  an  angel,  and  as  firm  in  the  cause  of  American 
Independence  as  Mount  Atlas,"— represented  most 
worthily  to-day  by  the  distinguished  orator  of  the  Cen 
tennial  at  Philadelphia,  as  well  as  by  more  than  one  dis 
tinguished  grandson  in  our  own  State  1 

Who  can  overlook  or  mistake  the  stalwart  figure  of 
Samuel  Chase  of  Maryland,  "of  ardent  passions,  of 
strong  mind,,of  domineering  temper,  of  a  turbulent  and 
boisterous  life,"  who  had  helped  to  burn  in  effigy  the 
Maryland  Stamp  Distributor  11  years  before,  and  who, 
we  are  t?oldby  one  who  krew  what  he  was  saying,  "  must 
ever  be  conspicuous  in  the  catalogue  of  that  Congress?" 

His  milder  and  more  amiable  colleague,  Charles  Carroll, 


was  engaged  at  that  m  merit  in  pressing  the  cause  of  in 
dependence  on  the  hesitating  Convention  of  Maryland  at 
Annapolis;  and  though,  as  we  shall  see,  he  signed  the 
Declaration  on  the  2d  of  August,  and  outlived  all  his 
compeers  on  that  roll  of  glory,  he  is  missing  from  the 
illustrious  band  as  we  look  in  upon  them  this  morning.  I 
cannot  but  remember  that  it  was  my  privilege  to  see  and 
know  that  venerable  person  in  my  early  manhood.  En 
tering  his  drawing-room,  nearly  tive-and-forty  years  ago, 
I  found  him  reposing  on  a  sofa  and  covered  with  a  shawl, 
and  was  not  even  aware  of  his  presence,  so  shrunk  and 
shriveled  by  the  lapse  of  years  was  his  originally  feeble 
frame.  Quotlibras  in  duce  summo  !  But  the  little  heap 
on  the  sofa  was  soon  seen  stirring,  and,  rousing  himself 
from  his  midday  nap,  he  rose  and  greeted  me  with  a 
courtesy  and  a  grace  which  I  can  never  forget.  In  the 
95th  year  of  his  age,  as  he  was,  and  within  a  few  months 
of  his  death,  it  is  not  surprising  that  there  should  be  little 
for  me  to  recall  of  that  interview,  save  his  eager  inquiries 
about  James  Madison,  whom  I  had  just  visited  at  Mont- 
pelier,  and  his  affectionate  allusion  to  John  Adams,  who 
had  gone  before  him  ;  and  save,  too,  the  exceeding  satis 
faction  for  myself  of  having  seen  and  pressed  the  hand 
of  the  last  surviving  signer  of  the  Declaration. 

But  Csesar  Rodney,  who  had  gone  home  on  the  same 
patriotic  errand  which  had  called  Carroll  to  Maryland, 
had  happily  returned  in  season,  and  had  come  in,  two 
days  before,  "  in  his  boots  fnd  spurs,"  to  give  the  casting 
vote  for  Delaware  in  favor  of  Independence. 

And  there  is  Arthur  Middleton  of  South  Carolina,  the 
bosom  friend  of  our  own  Hancock,  and  who  is  associated 
with  him  under  the  same  roof  in  those  elegant  hospitali 
ties  which  helped  to  make  men  know  and  understand  ana 
trust  each  other.  And  with  him  you  may  see  and  almost 
hear  the  eloquent  Edward  Rutledge,  who  not  long  before 
had  united  with  John  Adams  and  Richard  Henry  Lee  in 
urging  on  the  several  colonies  the  great  measure  of 
establishing  permanent  governments  at  once  for  them 
selves—a  decisive  step  which  we  may  not  forget  that 
South  Carolina  preceded  all  other  colonies  in  taking.  She 
took  it,  however,  with  a  reservation,  and  her  delegates 
were  not  quite  ready  to  vote  for  Independence  when  it 
was  first  proposed. 

But  Richard  Stockton  of  New-Jersey  must  not  be  un 
marked  or  unmentioned  in  our  rapid  survey,  more  espe 
cially  as  it  is  a  matter  of  record  that  his  original  doubts 
about  the  measure,  which  he  is  HOW  bravely  supporting, 
had  been  dissipated  and  dispelled  "by  the  irresistible 
and  conclusive  arguments  of  John  Adams." 

And  who  requires  to  be  reminded  that  our  "  Great  Bos- 
tonian,"  Benjamin  Franklin,  is  at  his  post  to-day,  repre 
senting  his  adopted  colony  with  less  support  than  he 
could  wish — for  Pennsylvania,  as  well  as  New- York,  was 
sadly  divided,  and  at  times  almost  paralyzed  by  her  divi 
sions — but  with  patriotism  and  firmness  and  prudence 
and  sagacity  and  philosophy  and  wit  und  common  sense 


48 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1870. 


and  courage  enough  to  constitute  a  whole  delegation  and 
to  represent  a  whole  colony  by  himself !  He  is  the  last 
man  of  that  whole  glorious  group  of  fifty— or  it  may  have 
been  one  or  two  more  or  one  or  two  less  than  fifty — who 
requires  to  be  pointed  out  in  order  to  be  the  observed  of 
all  observers. 

But  I  must  not  stop  here.  It  is  fit,  above  all  other 
things,  that,  while  we  do  justice  to  the  great  actors  in 
this  scene  from  other  colonies,  we  should  not  overlook 
the  delegates  from  our  own  colony.  It  is  fit,  above  all 
things,  that  we  should  recall  something  more  than  the 
names  of  the  men  who  represented  Massachusetts  in  that 
great  Assembly,  and  who  boldly  affixed  their  signatures 
in  her  behalf  to  that  immortal  instrument. 

Was  there  ever  a  more  signal  distinction  vouchsafed  to 
mortal  man  than  that  which  was  won  and  worn  by  John 
Hancock  a  hundred  years  ago  to-day  1  Not  altogether  a 
ereat  man;  not  without  some  grave  defects  of  character — 
we  remember  nothing  at  this  hour  save  his  Presidency  of 
the  Congress  of  the  Declaration  and  his  bold  and  noble 
signature  to  our  Magna  Charta.  Behold  him  in  the 
chair  which  is  still  standing  in  its  old  place— the  very 
same  chair  in  which  Washington  was  to  sit  eleven  years 
later  as  President  of  the  Convention  which  framed  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States ;  the  very  same  chair, 
emblazoned  on  the  back  of  which  Franklin  was  to  descry 
"  a  rising,  and  not  a  setting  sun,"  when  that  Constitution 
had  been  finally  adopted— behold  him,  the  young  Boston 
merchant,  not  yet  quite  forty  years  of  age,  not  only  with 
a  princely  fortune  at  stake,  but  with  a  price  at  that 
moment  upon  his  own  head,  sitting  there  to-day  in  all  the 
calm  composure  and  dignity  which  so  peculiarly  charac 
terized  him,  and  which  nothing  seemed  able  to  relax  or 
ruffle.  He  had  chanced  to  come  on  to  the  Congress  dur 
ing  the  previous  year  just  as  Peyton  Randolph  had  been 
compelled  to  relinquish  his  post  and  go  home  to  die;  and, 
having  been  unexpectedly  elected  as  his  successor,  he 
hesitated  about  taking  the  seat.  But  grand  old  Benjamin 
Harrison  of  Virginia,  we  are  told,  was  standing  beside 
him,  and  with  the  ready  good  humor  that  loved  a  joke 
even  in  the  Senate  House,  he  seized  the  modest  candidate 
in  his  athletic  arms  and  placed  him  in  the  Presidential 
chair;  then,  turning  to  some  of  the  members  around,  he 
exclaimed :  "  We  will  show  Mother  Britain  how  little  we 
care  for  her  by  making  a  Massachusetts  man  our  Presi 
dent  whom  she  has  excluded  from  pardon  by  a  public 
proclamation." 

Behold  him !  He  has  risen  for  a  moment.  He  has  put 
the  question.  The  Declaration  is  adopted.  It  is  already 
late  in  the  evening,  and  all  formal  promulgation  of  the 
day's  doings  must  be  postponed.  After  a  grace  of  three 
days,  the  air  will  be  vibrating  with  the  joyous  tones  of 
the  old  bell  in  the  cupola  over  his  head,  proclaiming  lib 
erty  to  all  mankind,  and  with  the  responding  acclama 
tions  of  assembled  multitudes.  Meantime,  for  him,  how 
ever,  a  simple  but  solemn  duty  remains  to  bo  discharged. 


The  paper  is  before  him.  You  may  see  the  very  table  on 
which  it  was  laid,  and  the  very  inkstand  which  awaits 
his  use.  No  hesitation  now.  He  dips  his  pen,  and  with 
an  untrembling  hand  proceeds  to  execute  a  signature, 
which  would  seem  to  have  been  studied  in  the  schools, 
and  practiced  in  the  counting-room,  and  shaped  and  mod 
eled  day  by  day  in  the  correspondence  of  mercantile  and 
political  manhood,  until  it  should  be  meet  for  the  authen 
tication  of  some  immortal  act ;  and  which,  as  Webster 
grandly  said,  has  made  his  name  as  imperishable  "  as  if 
it  were  written  between  Orion  and  the  Pleiades." 

Under  that  signature,  with  only  the  attestation  of  a 
secretary,  the  Declaration  goes  forth  to  the  American 
people,  to  be  printed  in  their  journals,  to  be  proclaimed 
in  their  streets,  to  be  published  from  their  pulpits,  to  be 
read  at  the  head  of  their  armies,  to  be  incorporated  for 
ever  into  their  history.  The  British  forces,  driven  away 
from  Boston,  are  now  landing  on  Staten  Island,  and  the 
reverses  of  Long  Island  are  just  awaiting  us.  They  were 
met  by  the  promulgation  of  this  act  of  offense  and  defi 
ance  to  all  lojTal  authority.  But  there  was  no  individual 
responsibility  for  that  act,  save  in  the  signsfllhre  of  John 
Hancock,  President,  and  Charles  Thomson,  Secretary. 
Not  until  the  2d  of  August  was  our  young  Boston  mer 
chant  relieved  from  the  perilous,  the  appalling  grandeur 
of  standing  sole  sponsor  for  the  revolt  of  thirteen  colo 
nies  and  three  millions  of  people.  Sixteen  or  seventeen 
years  before,  as  a  very  young  man,  he  had  made  a  visit  to 
London,  and  was  present  at  the  burial  of  George  II.  and 
at  the  coronation  of  George  III.  He  is  now  not  only  the 
witness  but  the  instrument,  and  in  some  sort  the  imper 
sonation,  of  a  far  more  substantial  change  of  dynasty  on 
his  own  soil — the  burial  of  royalty  under  any  and  every 
litle,  and  the  coronation  of  a  sovereign  whose  scepter 
has  already  endured  for  a  century,  and  whose  sway  has 
already  embraced  three  times  thirteen  States  and  more 
than  thirteen  times  three  millions  of  people  ! 

Ah,  if  his  quaint,  picturesque,  charming  old  mansion- 
ho\ise,  so  long  the  gem  of  Beacon-st.,  could  have  stood 
till  this  day,  our  Centennial  decorations  and  illumina 
tions  might  haply  have  so  marked,  and  sanctified,  and 
glorified  it,  that  the  rage  of  reconstruction  would  have 
passed  over  it  still  longer,  and  spared  it  for  the  reverent 
gaze  of  other  generations.  But  his  own  name  and  fame 
are  secure ;  and,  whatever  may  have  been  the  foibles  or 
faults  of  his  later  years,  to-day  we  will  remember  that 
momentous  and  matchless  signature,  and  him  who  made 
it,  with  nothing  but  respect,  admiration,  and  gratitude. 

IV. 

SAMUEL  AND  JOHN  ADAMS. 
But  Hancock,  as  I  need  not  remind  you,  was  not  the 
only  prescribed  patriot  who  represented  Massachusetts 
at  Philadelphia  on  the  day  we  are  commemorating.  His 
associate  in  Gen.  Gage's  memorable  exception  from 
rardon  is  close  at  his  aide.  He  who,  as-a  Harvard  College 


A  Century  of  Self-Government— l\lntlirop. 


student,  in  1743,  had  maintained  tlie  affirmative  of  the 
thesis,  "  Whether  it  be  lawful  to  resist  the  Supreme 
Magistrate,  if  the  commonwealth  cannot  otherwise  be 
preserved,"  and  who,  during  those  whole  three-and 
thirty  years  since  had  been  training  up  himself  and 
training  up  his  fellow-countrymen  in  the  nurture  and 
admonition  of  the  Lord  and  of  Liberty;  he  who  had 
replied  to  Gage's  recommendation  to  him  to  make  his 
peace  with  the  King,  "  I  trust  I  have  long  since  made  my 
peace  with  the  King  of  Kings,  and  no  personal  considera 
tions  shall  induce  me  to  abandon  the  righteous  cause  of 
my  country;"  he  who  had  drawn  up  the  Boston  Instruc 
tions  to  her  Representatives  in  the  General  Court, 
adopted  at  Faneuil  Hall,  on  the  24th  of  May,  1764— 
the  earliest  protest  against  the  Stamp  act,  and 
one  of  the  grandest  papers  of  our  whole  Revo 
lutionary  period ;  he  who  had  instituted  and  organized 
those  Committees  of  Correspondence,  without  which  we 
could  have  had  no  united  counsels,  no  concerted  action, 
no  union,  no  success  ;  he  who,  after  the  massacre  of 
March  5,  1770,  had  demanded  so  heroically  the  removal 
from  Boston  of  the  British  regiments,  ever  afterward 
known  as  "  Sam  Adams's  regiments,"  telling  the  Gov 
ernor  to  his  face,  with  an  emphasis  and  an  eloquence 
which  were  hardly  ever  exceeded  since  Demosthenes 
stood  on  the  Bema,  or  Paul  on  Mars  Hill,  "  If  the  Lieu 
tenant-Governor  or  Col.  Dalryrnple,  or  both  together, 
have  authority  to  remove  one  regiment  they  have  au 
thority  to  remove  two  ;  and  nothing  short  of  the  total 
evacuation  of  the  town  by  all  the  regular  troops  will  sat 
isfy  the  public  mind  or  preserve  the  peace  of  the  prov 
ince  ;"  he,  "  the  Palinurus  of  the  American  Revolution," 
as  Jefferson  once  called  him,  but,  thank  Heaven  !  a  Paii- 
nurus  who  was  never  put  asleep  at  the  helm,  never 
thrown  into  the  sea,  but  who  is  still  watching  the  com 
pass  and  the  stars,  and  steering  the  ship  as  she  enters  at 
last  the  haven  he  has  so  long  yearned  for— the  veteran 
Samuel  Adams,  the  disinterested,  inflexible,  Incorrupti 
ble  statesman— is  second  to  no  one  in  that  whole  Con 
gress,  hardly  second  to  any  one  in  the  whole  13  colonies, 
in  his  claim  to  the  honors  and  grateful  acknowledgments 
of  this  hour.  We  have  just  gladly  hailed  his  statue  on 
its  way  to  the  Capitol. 

Nor  must  the  name  of  Robert  Treat  Paine  be  forgotten 
among  the  five  delegates  of  Massachusetts  in  that  Hall 
of  Independence,  a  hundred  years  ago  to-day — an  able 
lawyer,  a  learned  judge,  a  just  man  ;  connected  by  mar 
riage,  if  I  mistake  not,  Mr.  Mayor,  with  your  own  gal 
lant  grandfather,  Gen.  Cobb,  and  who  himself  inherited 
the  blood  and  illustrated  the  virtues  of  the  hero  and 
statesman  whose  name  he  bore— Robert  Treat,  a  most 
distinguished  officer  in  King  Philip's  War,  and  afterward 
a  worthy  Governor  of  Connecticut. 

And  with  him,  too.  is  Elbridge  Gerry,  the  very 
youngest  member  of  the  whole  Continental  Congress, 
just  thirty-two  years  of  age— who  had  been  one  of  the 


chosen  friends  of  the  proto-martyr,  Gen.  Jo$eph  War 
ren,  who  was  with  Warren  at  Watertowu  the  very  last 
night  before  he  fell  at  Bunker  Hill,  and  iuto'whose  ear 
that  heroic  volunteer  had  whispered  those  memorable 
words  of  presentment,  "  Dulce  et  decorum  est  pro  pa- 
tria  mori ; "  who  lived  himself  to  serve  his  Common 
wealth  and  the  Nation  ardently  and  efficiently  at  home 
and  abroad,  ever  in  accordance  with  his  own  patriotic 
injunction,  "  It  is  the  duty  of  every  citizen,  though  he 
may  have  but  one  day  to  live,  to  devote  that  day  to  the 
service  of  his  country,"  and  died  on  his  way  to  his  post 
as  Vice-Presidentof  the  United  States. 

One  more  name  is  still  to  be  pronounced.  One  more 
star  of  that  little  Massachusetts  cluster  is  still  to  be  ob 
served  and  noted.  And  it  is  one  which,  on  the  precise 
occasion  we  commemorate — one  which,  during  those 
great  days  of  June  and  July,  1776,  on  which  the  question 
of  independence  was  immediately  discussed  and  decided, 
—had  hardly  "a  fellow  in  the  firmament,"  and  which  was 
certainly  "  the  bright,  particular  star"  of  our  own  con 
stellation.  You  will  all  have  anticipated  me  in  naming 
John  Adams.  Beyond  all  doubt  his  is  the  Massachusetts 
name  most  prominently  associated  with  the  immediate 
day  we  celebrate. 

Others  may  have  been  earlier  or  more  active  than  he 
in  preparing  the  way.  Others  may  have  labored  longer 
and  more  zealously  to  instruct  the  popular  mind  and  in 
flame  the  popular  heart  for  the  great  step  which  was 
now  to  be  taken.  Others  may  have  been  more  ardent,  as 
they  unquestionably  were  more  prominent,  in  the  various 
stages  of  the  struggle  against  Writs  of  Assistance,  and 
Stamp  Acts,  and  Tea  Taxes.  But  from  the  date  of  that 
marvelous  letter  of  his  to  Nathan  Webb,  in  1755,  when 
lie  was  less  than  20  years  old,  he  seems  to  have  fore 
cast  the  destinies  of  this  continent  as  few  other  men  of 
any  age  at  that  day  had  done  ;  while  from  the  moment 
at  which  the  Continental  Congress  took  the  question  of 
Independence  fairly  in  hand,  as  a  question  to  be  decided 
and  acted  on,  until  they  had  brought  it  to  its  final  issue 
in  the  Declaration,  his  was  the  voice,  above  and  before 
all  other  voices,  which  commanded  the  ears,  convinced 
the  minds,  and  inspired  the  hearts  of  his  colleagues,  and 
triumphantly  secured  the  result. 

I  need  not  speak  of  him  in  other  relations  or  in  after 
years.  His  long  life  of  varied  and  noble  service  to  his 
country,  in  almost  every  sphere  of  public  duty,  domestic 
and  foreign,  belongs  to  history ;  and  history  has  long  ago 
taken  it  in  charge.  But  the  testimony  which  was  borne 
to  his  grand  efforts  and  utterances,  by  the  author  of  the 
Declaration  himself,  can  never  be  gainsaid,  never  be 
weakened,  never  be  forgotten.  That  testimony,  old  as  it 
is,  familiar  as  it  is,  belongs  to  this  day.  John  Adams  will 
be  remembered  and  honored  forever,  in  every  true 
American  heart,  as  the  acknowledged  Champion  of  Inde 
pendence  in  the  Continental  Congress—"  coming  out  witli 


50 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


a  power  which  moved  us  from  our  seats  "— "  our  Colossus 
on  the  floor." 

And  when  we  recall  the  circumstances  of  his  death— 
the  year,  the  day,  the  hour— and  the  last  words  upon  his 
dying  lips,  "  Independence  forever  "—who  can  help  feel 
ing  that  there  was  some  mysterious  tie  holding  back  his 
heroic  spirit  from  the  skies,  until  it  should  be  set  free 
amid  the  exulting  shouts  of  his  country's  first  National 
Jubilee ! 

But  not  his  heroic  spirit  alone  ! 

In  this  rapid  survey  of  the  men  assembled  at  Philadel 
phia  a  hundred  years  ago  to-day,  I  began  with  Thomas 
Jefferson  of  Virginia,  and  I  end  with  John  Adams  of 
Massachusetts,  and  no  one  can  hesitate  to  admit  that, 
under  God,  they  were  the  very  Alpha  and  Omega  of  that 
day's  doings — the  pen  and  the  tongue — the  masterly 
author,  and  the  no  less  masterly  advocate  of  the  Decla 
ration. 

V. 
THE    STATESMEN. 

And  now,  my  friends,  what  legend  of  ancient  Rome  or 
Greece  or  Egypt,  what  myth  of  prehistoric  mythology, 
what  story  of  Herodotus,  or  fable  of  .<Esop,  or  metamor 
phosis  of  Ovid,  would  have  seemed  more  fabulous  and 
mythical— did  it  rest  on  any  remote  or  doubtful  tradition, 
or  had  not  so  many  of  us  lived  to  be  startled  and  tJirilled 
and  awed  by  it— than  the  fact,  that  these  two  men,  under 
so  many  different  circumstances  and  surroundings,  of 
age  and  constitution  and  climate,  widely  distant  from 
each  other,  living  alike  in  quiet  neighborhoods,  remote 
from  the  smoke  and  stir  of  cities,  and  long  before  rail 
roads  and  telegraphs  had  made  any  advances  toward 
the  annihilation  or  abridgment  of  space,  should  have 
been  released  to  their  rest  and  summoned  to  the  skies, 
not  only  on  the  same  day,  but  that  day  the  Fourth  of 
July,  and  that  Fourth  of  July  the  Fiftieth  Anniversary 
of  that  great  Declaration  which  they  had  contended  for 
and  carried  through  so  triumphantly  side  by  side !' 

What  an  added  emphasis  Jefferson  would  have  given 
to  the  Inscription  on  this  little  desk—"  Politics,  as  well 
as  Religion,  has  its  superstitions,"  could  he  have  fore 
seen  the  close  even  of  his  own  life,  much  more  the  simul 
taneous  close  of  these  two  lives,  on  the  Day  of  days !  Oh, 
let  me  not  admit  the  idea  of  superstition !  Let  me  rather 
reverently  say,  as  Webster  said  at  the  time,  in  that  mag 
nificent  eulogy  which  left  so  little  for  any  one  else  to  say 
as  to  the  lives  or  deaths  of  Adams  and  Jefferson :  "  As 
their  lives  themselves  were  the  gifts  of  Providence,  who 
is  not  willing  to  recognize  in  their  happy  termination,  as 
well  ae  in  their  long  continuanc,  proofs  that  our  country 
and  its  benefactors  are  objects  of  His  care  1" 

And  now  another  fifty  years  have  pased  away,  and 

we  are  holding  our  high  Centennial  Festival ;  and  still 

the  most  striking,  most  impressive,  most  memorable  co- 

*  incidence  in  all  American  history,  or  oven  in  the  authen 


tic  records  of  mankind,  is  without  a  visible  monument 
anywhere ! 

In  the  interesting  little  City  of  Weimar,  renowned  as 
the  resort  and  residence  of  more  than  one  of  the  greatest 
philosophers  and  poets  of  Germany,  many  a  traveler 
must  have  seen  and  admired  the  charming  statues  of 
Goethe  and  Schiller,  standing  side  by  side  and  hand  in 
hand,  on  a  single  pedestal,  and  offering,  as  it  were,  the 
laurel  wreath  of  literary  priority  or  preeminence  to  each 
other.  Few  nobler  works  of  art,  in  conception  or  execu 
tion,  can  be  found  on  the  continent  of  Europe.  And 
what  could  be  a  worthier  or  a  juster  commemoration  of 
the  marvelous  coincidence  of  wl»ach  I  have  just  spoken 
and  of  the  men  who  are  the  subjects  of  it,  and  of  the 
declaration  with  which,  alike  in  their  lives  and  in  their 
deaths,  that  they  are  so  peculiarly  and  so  signally  asso 
ciated,  than  just  such  a  monument,  with  the  statues  of 
Adams  and  Jefferson,  side  by  side  and  hand  in  hand,  upon 
the  same  base,  pressing  upon  each  other,  in  mutual  ac 
knowledgment  and  deference,  the  victor  palm  of  triumph 
for  whieh  they  must  ever  be  held  in  common  and  equal 
honor  1  It  would  be  a'  new  tie  between  Massachusetts 
and  Virginia.  It  would  be  a  new  bond  of  that  Union 
which  is  the  safety  and  glory  of  both.  It  would  be  a  new 
pledge  of  that  restored  good  will  between  the  North  and 
South,  which  is  the  herald  and  harbinger  of  a  second 
century  of -National  Independence.  It  would  be  a  fit 
recognition  of  the  great  hand  of  God  in  our  history ! 

At  all  events,  it  is  one  of  the  crying  omissions  and 
neglects  which  reproach  us  all  this  day,  that  "  glorious 
old  John  Adams  "  is  without  any  proportionate  public 
monument  in  the  State  of  which  he  was  one  of  the  grand 
est  citizens  and  sons,  and  in  whose  behalf  he  rendered 
such  inestimable  services  to  his  country.  It  is  almost 
ludicrous  to  look  around  and  see  who  has  been  commem 
orated,  apd  he  neglected!  He  might  be  seen  standing 
alone,  as  he  knew  so  well  how  to  stand  alone  in  life.  He 
might  bo  seen  grouped  with  his  illustrious  son,  only 
second  to  himself  in  his  claims  on  the  omitted  posthu 
mous  honors  of  his  native  State.  Or,  if  the  claim  of  noble 
women  to  such  commemorations  were  ever  to  be  recog^ 
nized  on  our  soil,  he  might  be  lovingly  grouped  with  that 
incomparable  wife,  from  whom  he  was  often  separated 
by  public  duties  and  personal  dangers,  and  whose  familiar 
correspondence  with  him,  and  his  with  her,  furnishes  a. 
picture  of  fidelity  and  affection,  and  of  patriotic  zeal  and 
courage  and  self-sacrifice,  almost  without  a  parallel  in 
our  Revolutionary  Annals. 

But  before  all  other  statues,  let  us  have  those  of  Adams 
and  Jefferson  on  a  single  block,  as  they  stood  together  a 
hundred  years  ago  to-day— as  they  were  translated  to 
gether  just  fifty  years  ago  to-day— foremost  for  Independ 
ence  in  their  lives,  and  in  their  deaths  not  divided ! 
Next,  certainly,  to  the  completion  of  the  National  Monu. 
ment  to  Washington,  at  the  Capital,  this  double  statue 
of  this  "  double  star  "  of  the  Declaration  calls  for  the  cou- 


A  Century  of  Self-Government—  Winthrop. 


51 


tributions  of  a  patriotic  people.  It  would  have  some- 
tiling  of  special  appropriateness  as  the  first  gift  to  that 
Boston  Park,  which  is  to  date  from  the  Centennial  Period. 

I  have  felt,  Mr.  Mayor  and  fellow-citizens,  as  I  am  sure 
you  all  must  feel,  that  the  men  who  were  gathered  at 
Philadelphia  a  hundred  years  ago  to-dfty,  familiar  as 
their  names  and  their  story  may  be  to  ourselves  and  to  all 
the  world,  had  an  imperative  claim  to  the  first  and  high 
est  honors  of  this  Centennial  anniversary.  But,  having 
paid  these  passing  tributes  to  their  memory,  I  hasten  to 
turn  to  considerations  less  purely  personal. 

The  Declaration  has  been  adopted,  and  has  been  sent 
forth  in  a  hundred  journals  and  on  a  thousand  broadsides 
to  every  camp  and  council  chamber,  to  every  town  and 
village  and  hamlet  and  fireside  throughout  the  colonies. 
What  was  it  1  What  did  it  declare  1  What  was  its  right 
ful  interpretation  and  intention"  ?  Under  what  circum 
stances  was  it  adopted  !  What  did  it  accomplish  for  our 
selves  and  for  mankind  1 

A  recent  and  powerful  writer  on  "  The  Growth  of  the 
English  Constitution,"  whom  I  had  the  pleasure  of  meet 
ing  at  the  Commencement  of  Old  Cambridge  University 
two  years  ago,  says  most  strikingly  and  most  justly  : 
"  There  are  certain  great  political  documents,  each  of 
which  forms  a  landmark  in  our  political  history.  There 
is  the  Great  Charter,  the  Petition  of  Rights,  the  Bill  of 
Rights."  "  But  not  one  of  them,"  he  adds,  "  gave  itself 
out  as  the  enactment  of  anything  new.  All  claimed  to 
set  forth,  with  new  strength  it  might  be,  and  with  new 
clearness,  those  rights  of  Englishmen  which  were  already 
old."  The  same  remark  has  more  recently  been  incor 
porated  into  "  A  Short  History  of  the  English  People." 
"  In  itself,"  says  the  writer  of  that  admirable  little  vol 
ume,  "  the  Charter  was  no  novelty,  nor  did  it  claim  to 
establish  any  new  constitutional  principles.  The  Charter 
of  Henry  I.  formed  the  basis  of  the  whole,  and  the  ad 
ditions  to  it  are,  for  the  most  part,  formal  recognitions  of 
the  judicial  and  administrative  changes  introduced  by 
Henry  II." 

So  substantially— so  almovSt  precisely— it  may  be  said  of 
the  great  American  charter,  which  was  drawn  up  by 
Thomas  Jefferson  on  the  precious  little  desk  which  lies 
before  rue.  It  made  no  pretensions  to  novelty.  The  men 
of  1776  were  not  in  any  sense,  certainly  not  in  any  sedi 
tious  sense,  greedy  of  novelties— "  avidi  nova  rum  rerum." 
They  had  claimed  nothing  new.  They  desired  nothiwg 
new.  Their  old  original  rights  as  Englishmen  were  all 
they  sought  to  enjoy,  and  those  they  resolved  to  vindicate. 
It  was  the  invasion  and  denial  of  those  old  rights  of  Eng 
lishmen  which  they  resisted  and  revolted  from. 

As  our  excellent  fellow-citizen,  Mr.  Dana,  so  well  said 
publicly  at  Lexington  last  year,— and  as  we  should  all 
have  been  glad  to  have  him  in  the  way  of  quietly  repeat 
ing  in  London  this  year,—"  We  were  not  the  revolution 
ists.  The  King  and  Parliament  were  tJte  revolutionists. 


They  were  the  radical  innovators.    We  were  the  conser 
vators  of  existing  institutions." 

No  one  has  forgotten,  or  can  ever  forget,  how  early 
and  how  emphatically  all  this  was  admitted  by  some 
of  the  grandest  statesmen  and  orators  of  England  her- 
sel".  It  was  the  attempt  to  subvert  our  rights  as  English 
men  which  roused  Chatham  to  some  of  his  most  majestic 
efforts.  It  was  the  attempt  to  subvert  our  rights  as 
Englishmen  which  kindled  Burke  to  not  a  few  of  his 
most  brilliant  utterances.  It  was  the  attempt  to  subvert 
our  rights  as  Englishmen  which  inspired  BarrS  and 
Conway  and  Cauideii  with  appeals  and  arguments  and 
phrases  which  will  keep  their  memories  fresh  whem  all 
else  associated  with  them  is  forgotten.  The  names  of 
all  three  of  them,  as  you  \TBll  know,  have  long  been  the 
cherished  designations  of  American  towns. 

They  all  perceived  and  understood  that  we  were  con 
tending  for  English  rights,  and  against  the  violation  of 
the  great  principles  of  English  liberty.  Nay,  not  a  few 
of  them  perceived  and  understood  that  they  ^  ere  fight 
ing  their  battles  as  well  as  our  own,  and  that  nhe  liber 
ties  of  Englishmen  upon  their  own  soil  were  virtually  in 
volved  in  our  cause  and  in  our  contest. 

There  is  a  most  notable  letter  of  Josiah  Quiocy,  jr/s, 
written  from  London  at  the  end  of  1774— a  few  months 
only  before  that  young  patriot  returned  to  die  so  sadly 
within  sight  of  his  native  shores — in  which  he  tolls  his 
wife,  to  whom  he  was  not  likely  to  write  for  any  mere 
sensational  effect,  that  "  some  of  the  first  characters  for 
understanding,  integrity,  and  spirit,"  whom  he  had  met 
in  London,  had  used  language  of  this  sort :  "  This  na 
tion  is  lost.  Corruption  and  the  influence  of  the  crown 
have  led  us  into  bondage,  and  a  standing  army  has  riv 
eted  our  chains.  To  America  only  can  we  look  for  sal 
vation.  'Tis  America  only  can  save  England.  Unite  and 
persevere.  You  must  prevail  —  you  must  triumph." 
Quincy  was  careful  not  to  betray  names,  in  a  letter  which 
might  be  intercepted  before  it  reached  its  destination. 
But  we  know  the  men  with  whom  he  had  been  brought 
into  association  by  Franklin  and  other  friends — men  like 
Shelburne,  and  Hartley,  and  Pownall,  and  Priestley,  and 
Brand  Hollis,  and  Sir  George  SaviUe,  to  say  nothing  of 
Burke  and  Chatham.  The  language  was  not  lost  upon 
vis.  We  did  unite  and  persevere.  We  did  prevail  and 
triumph.  And  it  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  we  did 
"  save  England."  We  saved  her  from  herself  ;  saved  her 
from  being  the  successful  instrument  of  overthrowing 
the  rights  of  Englishmen  ;  saved  her  "  from  the  poisoned 
chalice  which  would  have  been  commended  to  her  own 
lips;"  saved  her  from  "the  bloody  instructions  which 
would  have  returned  to  plague  the  inventor."  Not  only 
was  it  true,  a?  Lord  Macaulay  said  in  one  of  his  brilliant 
essays,  that  "  England  was  never  so  rich,  so  great,  so 
formidable  to  foreign  princes,  so  absolutely  mistress  of 
the  seas,  as.  since  the  alienation  of  her  American  colo 
nies,"  but  it  is  not  less  true  that  England  came  out  of 
that  contest  with  new  and  larger  views  of  liberty  ;  with 
a  broader  and  deeper  sense  of  what  was  due  to  human 
rights,  and  with  an  experience  of  incalculable  value  to 
her  in  the  management  of  the  vast  colonial  system  wMoh 
remained,  or  was  in  store  for  her. 

A  vast  and  gigantic  colonial  system,  beyond  doubt,  it 
has  proved  to  be.  She  was  just  entering,  a  hundred 
years  ago,  on  that  wonderful  career  of  conquest  in  tho 
East  which  was  to  compensate  her — if  it  were  a  compen 
sation—for  her  impending  losses  in  the  West.  Her  gal 
lant  Coruwullis  was  soon  to  receive  the  jeweled  sword  of 
Tippoo  Suib  at  Bangalore,  in  exchange  for  that  vvkieh  ho 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1876. 


was  now  destined  to  surrender  to  Washington  at  York- 
town.  It  is  certainly  not  among  the  least  striking  coin 
cidences  of  our  Centennial  year  that  at  the  very  moment 
when  we  are  celebrating  the  event  which  stripped  Great 
Britain  of  thirteen  colonies  and  three  millions  of  subjects 
— now  grown  into  thirty-nine  States  and  more  than  forty 
millions  of  people — she  is  welcoming  the  return  of  her 
amiable  and  genial  Prince  from  a  royal  progress  through 
the  widespread  regions  of  "  Ormus  and  of  Ind,"  bringing 
back,  to  lay  at  the  foot  ot  the  British  throne,  the  homage 
of  nine  principal  provinces  and  a  hundred  and  forty- 
eight  feudatory  states,  and  of  not  less  than  two  hundred 
and  forty  millions  of  people,  from  Ceylon  to  the  Hima 
layas,  and  affording  ample  justification  for  the  Queen's 
new  title  of  Empress  of  India.  Among  all  the  parallel 
isms  of  modern  history  there  are  few  more  striking  and 
impressive  than  this. 

The  American  colonies  never  quarreled  or  caviled 
about  the  titles  of  their  sovereign.  If,  as  has  been  said, 
•'  they  went  to  war  about  a  preamble,"  it  was  not  about 
the  preamble  of  the  royal  n.'une.  It  was  the  imperial 
power,  the  more  than  imperial  pretensions  and  usurpa 
tions  which  drove  them  to  rebellion.  The  Declaration 
was,  in  its  own  terms,  a  personal  and  most  stringent 
arraignment  ot  the  King.  It  could  have  been  nothing 
else.  George  III.  was  to  us  the  sole  responsible  instru 
ment  of  oppression.  Parliament  had,  indeed,  sustained 
him  ;  but  the  Colonies  had  never  admitted  the  authority 
of  a  Parliament  in  which  they  had  no  representation. 
There  is  no  passage  in  Mr.  Jefferson's  paper  more  care 
fully  or  more  felicitously  worded  than  that  in  which  he 
says  of  the  sovereign,  that  "  he  has  combined  with  others 
to  subject  us  to  a  jurisdiction  foreign  to  our  constitutions 
and  unacknowledged  by  our  laws,  giving  his  assent  to 
their  acts  of  pretended  legislation."  A  slip  of  "  the 
masterly  pen"  on  this  point  might  have  cost  us  our  con 
sistency  ;  but  that  pen  was  on  its  guard,  and  this  is  the 
only  allusion  to  Lords  or  Commons.  We  could  recognize 
no  one  but  the  monarch.  We  could  contend  with  noth 
ing  less  than  royalty.  We  could  separate  ourselves  only 
from  the  crown.  English  precedents  had  abundantly 
taught  us  that  kings  were  not  beyond  the  reach  of  ar 
raignment  and  indictment ;  and  arraignment  and  in 
dictment  were  then  our  only  means  of  justifying  our 
cause  to  ourselves  and  to  the  world.  Yes ;  harsh,  severe, 
stinging,  scolding, — I  had  almost  said, — as  that  long 
series  of  allegations  and  accusations  may  sound,  and 
certainly  does  sound,  as  we  read  it  or  listen  to  it,  in  cold 
blood,  a  century  after  the  issues  are  all  happily  settled, 
it  was  a  temperate  and  dignified  utterance  under  the 
circumstances  of  the  case,  and  breathed  quite  enough 
of  moderation  to  be  relished  or  accepted  by  those  who 
were  bearing  the  brunt  of  so  terrible  a  struggle  for  life 
and  liberty  and  all  that  was  dear  to  them,  as  that  which 
those  issues  involved.  Nor  in  all  that  bitter  indictment 
is  there  a  single  count  which  does  not  refer  to,  and  rest 
upon,  some  violation  of  the  rights  of  Englishmen,  or 
some  violation  of  the  rights  of  humanity.  We  stand  by 
the  Declaration  to-day,  and  always,  and  disavow  nothing 
of  its  reasoning  or  its  rhetoric. 

And,  after  all,  Jefferson  was  not  a  whit  more  severe  on 
the  King  than  Chatham  had  been  on  the  King's  minis 
ters  six  months  before,  when  he  told  them  to  their  facos  : 
"  The  whole  of  your  political  conduct  has  been  one  con 
tinued  series  of  weakness,  temerity,  despotism,  igno 
rance,  futility,  negligence,  blundering,  and  the  most  noto 
rious  servility,  incapacity,  and  corruption."  Nor  was 
William  Pitt,  the  younger,  much  more  measured  in  his 
language,  at  a  later  period  of  our  struggle,  when  he  de 
clared  :  "  These  ministers  will  destroy  the  empire  they 


were  called  upon  to  save  before  the  indignation  of  a 
great  and  suffering  people  can  fall  upon  their  heads  in 
the  punishment  which  they  deserve.  I  affirm  the  war  to 
have  been  a  most  accursed,  wicked,  barbarous,  cruel,  un 
natural,  unjust,  and  diabolical  war." 

I  need  not  say,  fellow-citizens,  that  we  are  here  to  in 
dulge  in  no  reproaches  upon  Old  England  to-day,  as  we 
look  back  from  the  lofty  hight  of  a  century  of  independ 
ence  on  the  course  of  events  which  severed  u.s  from  her 
dominions.  We  are  by  no  means  in  the  mood  to  reopen 
the  adjudications  of  Ghent  or  of  Geneva ;  nor  can  we 
allow  the  ties  of  old  traditions  to  be  seriously  jarred,  ou 
such  an  occasion  as  this,  by  any  recent  failures  or  extra 
ditions,  however  vexatious  or  provoking;.  But  certainly, 
resentments  on  either  side,  for  anything  said  or  done 
during  our  revolutionary  period, — after  such  a  lapse  of 
time, — would  dishonor  the  hearts  which  cherished  them 
and  the  tongues  which  uttered  them.  Who  wonders  that 
George  the  Third  would  not  let  such  colonies  as  our  go 
without  a  struggle?  They  were  the  brightest  jewels  of 
his  crown.  Who  wonders  that  he  shrank  from  the  respon 
sibility  of  such  a  dismemberment  of  his  empire,  and  that 
his  brain  reeled  at  the  very  thought  of  it?  It  would 
have  been  a  poor  compliment  to  us  had  he  not  considered 
us  -worth  holding  at  any  and  every  cost.  We  should 
hardly  have  forgiven  him  had  he  not  desired  to  retain  us. 
Nor  can  we  altogether  wonder  that,  with  the  views  of 
kingly  prerogative  which  belonged  to  that  period,  and 
in  which  lie  was  educated,  he  should  have  preferred  the 
policy  of  coercion  to  that  of  conciliation,  and  should 
have  insisted  on  sending  over  troops  to  subdue  us. 

Our  old  mother  country  has  had  indeed,  a  peculiar 
destiny,  and  in  many  respects  a  glorious  one.  Not  alone 
with  her  drum-beat,  as  Webster  so  grandly  said,  has  she 
encircled  the  earth.  Not  alone  with  her  martial  airs  has 
she  kept  company  with  the  hours.  She  has  carried  civil 
ization  and  Christianity  wherever  she  has  carried  her  flag. 
She  has  carried  her  noble  tongue,  with  all  its  incompara 
ble  treasures  of  literature  and  science  and  religion, 
around  the  globe;  and,  with  our  aid — for  she  will  confess 
that  we  are  doing  our  full  part  in  this  line  of  extension — 
it  is  fast  becoming  the  most  pervading  speech  of  civilized 
man.  We  thank  God  at  this  hour,  and  at  every  hour, 
that  "  Chatham's  language  is  ouv  mother  tongue,"  and 
that  we  have  an  inherited  and  indisputable  share  in  the 
glory  of  so  many  of  the  great  names  by  which  that 
language  has  been  illustrated  and  adorned. 

But  she  has  done  more  than  all  this.  She  has  planted 
the  great  institutions  and  principles  of  civil  freedom  in 
every  latitude  where  she  could  find  a  foothold.  From 
her  our  Revolutionary  fathers  learned  to  understand 
and.l/alue  them,  and  from  her  they  inherited  the  spirit  to 
defend  them.  Not  in  vain  had  her  brave  barons  extorted 
Magna  Charta  from  King  John.  Not  in  vain  had  her 
Simon  de  Montfort  summoned  the  knights  and  burgesses, 
and  laid  the  foundations  of  a  Parliament  and  a  House  of 
Commons.  Not  in  vain  had  her  noble  Sir  John  Eliot 
died,  as  a'  martyr  of  free  speech,  in  the  Tower.  Not  in  vain 
had  her  heroic  Hampden  resisted  ship-money  and  died 
on  the  battle-field.  Not  in  vain  for  us,  certainly,  the  great 
examples  and  the  great  warnings  of  Cromwell  and  the 
Commonwealth,  or  those  sadder  ones  of  Sidney  and 
Russell,  or  that  later  and  more  glorious  one  still  of 
William  of  Orange. 

The  grand  lessons  of  her  own  history,  forgotten,  over 
looked,  or  resolutely  disregarded,  it  may  be,  on  her  own 
side  of  the  Atlantic,  in  the  days  we  are  commemorating, 
were  the  very  inspiration  of  her  colonies  on  this  side ; 
and  under  that  inspiration  they  contended  and  con 
quered.  And  though  she  may  sometimes  be  almost 


A   Century  of  Self- Govern m en t—  Win  throp. 


53 


tempted  to  take  sadly  upon  her  lips  tbe  words  of  the  old 
prophet,  "I  have  nourished  and  brought  up  children 
a  ud  they  have  rebelled  against  me,*'  she  has  long  ago 
learned  that  such  a  rebellion  as  ours  was  really  m  ner 
o \vninterest  and  for  her  own  ultimate  welfare— begun, 
continued,  and  ended,  as  it  was,  in  vindication  of  the 
liberties  of  Englishmen. 

I  cannot  forget  how  justly  and  eloquently  my  friend, 
Dr.  Ellis,  a  few  months  ago,  in  this  same  hall,  gave  ex 
pression  to  the  respect  which  is  so  widely  entertained  on 
tins  side  of  the  Atlantic  for  tbe  sovereign  lady  who  has 
now  graced  the  British  throne  for  nearly  forty  years. 
No  passage  of  his  admirable  oration  elicited  a  warmer 
response  from  the  multitudes  who  listened  to  him.  How 
much  of  the  growth  and  grandeur  of  Great  Britain  is 
associated  with  the  names  of  illustrious  women!  Even 
those  of  us  who  have,  no  fancy  for  female  suffrage  might 
be  well-nigh  tempted  to  take  refuge  from  the  incoui- 
jietenciea  and  intrigues  and  corruptions  of  men  under 
the  presidency  ol  the  purer  and  gentler  sex.  What 
would  English  history  be  without  the  names  of  Elizabeth 
and  Anne?  What  would  it  be  without  the  name  of  Vic 
toria  -of  whom  it  has  been  written  "  that  by  a  long 
course  of  loyal  acquiescence  in  the  declared  "wishes  of 
"her  people,  she  has  brought  about  what  is  nothing  less 
than  a  great  revolution— all  the  more  beneficent  because 
it  has  been  gradual  and  silent1?"  Ever  honored  be  her 
name  and  that  of  her  lamented  consort. 

Ever-l>eloved  and  loving  may  her  rule  be; 
And  when  old  Time  shall  l^ad  her  to  her  end. 
Goodness  and  she  fill  up  one  monument. 

The  Declaration  is  adopted  and  promulgated  ;  but  we 
may  not  forget  how  long  and  how  serious  a  reluctance 
there  had  been  to  take  the  irrevocable  step.  As  late  as 
September,  1774,  Washington  had  publicly  declared  his 
belief  that  independence  "  was  wished  by  no  thinking 
man."  As  late  as  the  6th  of  March,  1775,  in  his  memo 
rable  oration  in  the  Old  South,  with  all  the  associations 
of  "  the  Boston  massacre  "  fresh  in  his  heart,  Warren  had 
declared  that  "  independence  was  not  our  aim."  As  late 
as  July,  1775,  the  letter  of  the  Continental  Congress  to 
the  Lord  Mayor  and  Corporation  of  London  had  said  : 
<(  North  America,  my  lord,  wishes  most  ardently  for  a 
lasting  connection  with  Great  Britain,  011  terms  of  just 
and  equal  liberty,"  and  a  simultaneous  humble  petition 
to  the  King,  signed  by  every  member  of  the  Congress,  re 
iterated  the  same  assurance.  And  as  late  as  the  25th  of 
August,  1'775,  Jefferson  himself,  in  a  letter  to  the  John 
Randolph  of  that  day,  speaking  of  those  who  "  still  wish 
for  reunion  with  their  parent  country,"  says  most  em 
phatically,  "  I  am  one  of  those  ;  and  would  rather  be  in 
dependence  on  Great  Britain,  properly  limited,  than  on 
any  nation  on  earth,  or  than  on  no  nation."  Not  all  the 
blood  of  Lexington  and  Concord  and  Bunker  Hill,  crying 
from  the  ground  long  before  these  words  were  written, 
had  extinguished  the  wish  for  reconciliation  and  reunion 
even  in  the  heart  of  the  very  author  of  the  Declaration. 

Tell  me  not,  tell  me  not,  that  there  was  anything  of 
equivocation,  anything  of  hypocrisy  in  these  and  a  hun 
dred  other  similar  expressions  which  might  be  cited.  The 
truest  human  hearts'  are  full  of  such  inconsistency  and 
hypocrisy  as  that.  The  dearest  Mends,  the  tenderest 
relatives  are  never  more  overflowing  and  outpouring,  nor 
ever  more  sincere,  in  feelings  and  expressions  of  devo 
tion  and  love,  than  when  called  to  contemplate  some 
terrible  impending  necessity  of  final  separation  and 
divorce.  The  ties  between  us  and  Old  England  could  not 
be  sundered  without  sadness,  and  sadness  on  both  sides 
of  the  ocean.  Franklin,  albeit  his  eyes  were  "  unused  to 
1he  melting  mood,"  is  recorded  to  have  wept  as  he  left 


England,  in  view  of  the  inevitable  result  of  which  he 
was  coining  home  to  be  a  witness  and  an  instrument : 
and  I  have  heard  from  the  poet  Rogers's  own  lips,  what 
many  of  yon  may  have  read  in  his  Table-Talk,  how 
deeply  he  was  impressed,  as  a  boy,  by  his  father's  putting 
on  a  mourning  suit  when  he  heard  of  the  first  shedding 
of  American  blood. 

Nor  could  it,  in  the  nature  of  things,  have  been  only 
their  warm  and  undoubted  attachment  to  England  which 
made  so  many  of  the  men  of  1776  reluctant  to  the  last  to 
cross  the  Rubicon.  They  saw  clearly  before  them,  they 
could  not  help  seeing,  the  full  proportions,  the  tremend 
ous  odds,  of  the  contest  into  which  the  colonies  must  be 
plunged  by  such  a  step.  Think  you,  that  no  apprehen 
sions  and  anxieties  weighed  heavily  on  the  minds  and 
hearts  of  those  far-seeing  men  ?  Think  you,  that  as  their 
names  were  called  on  the  day  we  commemorate,  begin 
ning  with  Josiah  Bartlett  of  New-Hampshire,— or,  as  one 
by  one  they  approached  the  secretary's  desk  on  the  fol 
lowing  2d  of  August,  to  write  their  names  on  that  now 
hallowed  parchment,— they  did  not  realize  the  full  re 
sponsibility,  and  the  full  risk  to  their  country  and  to 
themselves,  which  such  a  vote  and  such  a  signature  in 
volved  ?  They  sat,  indeed,  with  closed  doors  ;  and  it  is 
only  from  traditions  or  eaves-droppings,  or  from  the 
casual  expressions  of  diaries  or  letters,  that  we  catch 
glimpses  of  what  was  done,  or  gleanings  of  what  was 
said.  But  how  full  of  import  are  some  of  those  glimpses 
and  gleanings. 

"  Will  you  sign  1"  said  Hancock  to  Charles  Carroll, 
who,  as  we  have  seen,  had  not  been  present  on  the  4th 
of  July.  "  Most  willingly,"  was  the  reply.  "  There 
goes  two  millions  with  a  dash  of  the  pen,"  says  one  of 
those  standing  by ;  while  anothei  remarks,  "  Oh,  Carroll, 
you  will  get  off,  there  are  so  many  Charles  Carrolls." 
And  then  we  may  see  him  stepping  back  to  the  desk,  and 
putting  that  addition—"  of  Carrol  Itou"— to  his  name, 
which  will  designate  him  forever,  and  be  a  prouder  title 
of  nobility  than  those  mthe  peerage  of  Great  Britain, 
which  were  afterward  adorned  by  his  accomplished  and 
fascinating  granddaughters. 

"  We  must  stand  by  each  other— we  must  hang  to 
gether,"— is  presently  heard  from  some  one  of  the  sign 
ers;  with  the  instant  reply,  "Yes,  we  must  hang  to 
gether,  or  we  shall  assuredly  hang  separately."  And,  on 
this  suggestion,  the  portly  and  humorous  Benjamin 
Harrison,  whom  we  have  seen  forcing  Hancock  into  the 
chair,  may  be  heard  bantering  our  spare  and  slender 
Elbridge  Gerry— levity  provoking  levity— and  telling  him 
with  grim  merriment  that,  when  that  hanging  scene 
arrives,  he  shall  have  the  advantage :  "  It  will  be  all  over 
with  me  in  a  moment,  but  you  will  be  kicking  in  the  air 
half  an  hour  after  I  am  gone !"  These  are  among  the 
the  "  asides"  of  the  drama,  but,  T  need  not  say,  they 
more  than  make  up  in  significance  for  all  they  may  seem 
to  lack  in  dignity. 

The  excellent  William  Ellery  of  Rhode  Island,  whose 
name  waa  afterward  borne  by  his  grandson,  our  revered 
Channiug,  often  spoke,  we  are  told,  of  the  scene  of  the 
signing,  and  spoke  of  it  as  an  event  which  many  regarded 
with  awe,  perhaps  with  uncertainty,  but  none  with  fear. 
"  I  was  determined,"  he  used  to  say,  "  to  see  how  all 
looked  as  they  signed  what  might  be  their  death  warrant. 
I  placed  myself  beside  the  secretary,  Charles  Thompson, 
and  eyed  each  closely  as  he  affixed  his  name  to  the  docu 
ment.  Undaunted  resolution  was  displayed  in  every 
countenance." 

"  You  inquire,"  wrote  John  Adams  to  William  Plumer 
"  whether  every  member  of  Congress  did,  on  the  4th  oj 
July,  1776,  in  fact,  cordially  approve  of  the  Declaration 


54 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  1870. 


of  Independence.  They  who  were  then  members  all 
signed  it,  and,  as  I  could  not  see  their  hearts,  it  would  be 
hard  for  me  to  say  that  they  did  not  approve  it ;  but,  as 
far  as  I  could  penetrate  the  intricate  internal  foldings  of 
their  souls,  I  then  believed,  and  have  not  since  altered 
my  opinion,  that  there  were  several  who  signed  with  re 
gret,  and  several  others  with  many  doubts  and  much 
lukewarmness.  The  measure  had  been  on  the  carpet  for 
months,  and  obstinately  opposed  it  from  day  to  day. 
Majorities  were  constantly  against  it.  For  many  days 
the  majority  depended  upon  Mr.  Hewes  of  North  Caro 
lina.  While  a  member  one  day  was  speaking  and  read 
ing  documents  from  all  the  colonies  to  prove  that  the 
public  opinion,  the  general  sense  of  all,  was  in  favor  of 
the  measure,  when  he  came  to  North  Carolina,  and  pro 
duced  letters  and  public  proceedings  which  demonstrated 
that  the  majority  of  that  colony  were  in  favor  of  it,  Mr. 
Hewes,  who  had  hitherto  constantly  voted  against  it, 
started  suddenly  upright,  and,  lifting  up  both  his  hands 
to  Heaven,  as  if  he  had  been  in  a  trance,  cried  out,  '  It  is 
done,  and  I  will  abide  by  it.'  I  would  give  more  for  a 
perfect  painting  of  the  terror  and  horror  upon  the  faces  of 
the  old  majority,  at  that  critical  moment,  than  for  the 
best  piece  of  Raphael." 

There  is  quite  enough,  in  these  traditions  and  hearsay^ 
in  these  glimpses  and  gleanings,  to  show  us  that  the  sup 
porters  and  signers  of  the  Declaration  were  not  blind  to 
the  responsibilities  and  hazards  in  which  they  were  in 
volving  themselves  and  the  country.  There  is  quite 
enough,  certainly,  in  these  and  other  indications,  to  give 
color  and  credit  to  what  I  so  well  remember  hearing  the 
late  Mr.  Justice  Story  say,  half  a  century  ago,  that,  as 
the  result  of  all  his  conversations  with  the  great  men  of 
the  revolutionary  period— and  especially  with  his  illus 
trious  aud  venerated  chief  on  the  bench  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States,  John  Marshall— he  was  con 
vinced  that  a  majority  of  the  Continental  Congress  was 
opposed  to  the  Declaration,  and  that  it  was  carried 
through  by  the  patient,  persistent,  and  overwhelming 
efforts  and  arguments  of  the  minority. 

Two  of  those  arguments,  as  Mr.  Jefferson  has  left  them 
on  record,  were  enough  for  that  occasion,  or  certainly  are 
enough  for  this. 

One  of  the  two  was,  "  That  the  people  wait  for  us  to 
lead  the  way;  that  they  are  in  favor  of  the  measure, 
though  the  instructions  given  by  some  of  their  repre 
sentatives  are  not."  And  most  true  indeed  it  was,  my 
friends,  at  that  day,  as  it  often  has  been  since  that  day  • 
that  the  people  were  ahead  of  their  so-called  leaders. 
The  minds  of  the  masses  were  made  up.  They  had  no 
doubts  or  misgivings.  They  demanded  that  indepen  d' 
euce  should  be  recognized  and  proclaimed.  John  Adams 
knew  how  to  keep  up  with  them.  Sam  Adams  had  kept 
his  finger  on  their  pulse  from  the  beginning,  and  had 
"  marked  time  "  for  every  one  of  their  advancing  steps. 
Patrick  Henry  and  Richard  Henry  Lee  and  Thomas  Jef 
ferson,  and  some  other  ardent  and  noble  spirits,  were 
liy  no  means  behind  them.  But  not  a  few  of  the  leaders 
were,  in  lact,  only  followers.  "  The  people  waited  for 
them  to  lead  the  way."  Independence  was  the  resolve 
and  the  act  of  the  American  people,  and  the  American 
people  gladly  received  and  enthusiastically  ratified,  and 
heroically  sustained  the  Declaration,  until  independence 
was  no  longer  a  question  either  at  homo  or  abroad.  Yes, 
our  great  charter,  as  we  fondly  call  it,  though  with  some 
thing,  it  must  be  confessed,  of  poetic  or  patriotic  license, 
was  no  temporizing  concession,  wrung  by  menaces  from 
reluctant  monarchs,  but  was  the  spontaneous  and  im 
perative  dictate  of  a  nation  resolved  to  be  free ! 
The  other  of  those  two  arguments  was  even  more  con 


clusive  and  more  clinching.  It  was,  "  that  the  question 
was  not  whether  by  a  declaration  of  independence  we 
should  make  ourselves  what  we  are  not,  but  whether  we 
should  declare  a  fact  which  already  exists." 

"  A  fact  which  already  exists !"  Mr.  Mayor  and  fel 
low-citizens,  there  is  no  more  interesting  historical 
truth  to  us  of  Boston  than  this.  Our  hearts  are  all  at 
Philadelphia  to-day,  as  I  have  already  said,  rejoicing  in 
all  that  is  there  said  and  done  in  honor  of  the  men  who 
made  this  day  immortal,  and  hailing  it,  with  our  fellow- 
countrymen,  from  ocean  to  ocean,  and  from  the  lakes  to 
the  Gulf,  as  our  national  birthday.  And  nobly  has  Phil 
adelphia  met  the  requisitions,  and  more  than  flulfilled 
the  expectations,  of  the  occasion ;  furnishing  a  f 6te  and  a 
pageant  of  which  the  whole  nation  is  proud.  Yet  we  are 
not  called  on  to  forget — we  could  not  be  pardoned,  in 
deed,  for  not  remembering— that,  while  the  Declaration 
was  boldly  and  grandly  made  in  that  hallowed  Pennsyl 
vania  hall,  independence  had  already  been  won— and 
won  here  in  Massachusetts.  It  was  said  by  some  one  of 
the  old  patriots— John  Adams,  I  believe— that  "the  Rev 
olution  was  effected  before  the  war  commenced;"  and 
Jefferson  is  now  our  authority  for  the  assertion  that  "  in 
dependence  existed  before  it  was  declared.  They  both 
knew  well  what  they  were  talking  about.  Congresses  in 
Carpenters'  Hall,  and  Congresses  in  the  old  Pennsylvania 
State  House,  did  grand  things,  and  were  composed  of 
grand  men,  and  we  render  to  their  memories  all  the 
homage  and  all  the  glory  which  they  so  richly  earned. 
But  here  in  Boston,  the  capital  of  Massachusetts,  and  the 
principal  town  of  British  North  America  at  that  day,  the 
question  had  already  been  brought  to  an  issue,  and  al 
ready  been  irrevocably  decided.  Here  the  manifest  des 
tiny  of  the  Colonies  had  been  recognized  and  accepted. 
It  was  upon  us,  as  all  the  world  knows,  that  the  blows  of 
British  oppression  fell  first  and  fell  heaviest— fell  like  a 
storm  of  hail  stones  and  coals  of  fire ;  and  where  they 
fell,  and  as  soon  as  they  fell,  they  were  resisted,  and  suc 
cessfully  resisted. 

Why,  away  back  in  1761,  when  George  the  Third  had 
been  but  a  year  on  his  throne,  and  when  the  printer's  ink 
on  the  pages  of  our  Harvard  "Pietas  et  Gratulatio" 
was  hardly  dry  ;  when  the  seven  years'  war  was  still  un 
finished,  in  which  New-England  had  done  her  full  share 
of  the  fighting,  and  reaped  her  full  share  of  the  glory, 
and  when  the  British  flag,  by  the  help  of  her  men  and 
money,  was  just  floating  in  triumph  over  the  whole 
American  continent — a  mad  resolution  had  been  adopted 
to  reconstruct — O  word  of  ill  omen ! — the  whole  colonial 
system,  and  to  bring  America  into  closer  conformity  and 
subjection  to  the  laws  of  the  mother  country.  A  revenue 
is  to  be  collected  here.  A  standing  army  is  to  be  estab 
lished  here.  The  navigation  act  and  acts  of  trade  are  to 
be  enforced  and  executed  here.  And  all  without  any 
representation  on  our  part.  The  first  practical  step  in 
this  direction  is  taken.  A  custom-house  officer,  named 
Cockle,  applies  to  the  Superior  Court  at  Salem  for  a  writ 
of  assistance1.  That  cockle-shell  exploded  like  dynamite  J 
The  Court  postpones  the  case,  and  orders  its  argument  in 
Boston.  And  then  and  there,  in  1761,  in  our  old  town 
house,  afterward  known  as  the  Old  State  House— alas, 
alas,  that  it  is  thought  necessary  to  talk  about  removing 
or  even  reconstructing  it !— James  Otis,  as  John  Adams 
himself  tells  us,  "breathed  in  to  this  nation  the  breath  of 
life."  Then  and  there,"  he  adds,  and  he  spoke  of  what  he 
witnessed  and  heard,  "  then  and  there  the  child  Independ 
ence  was  born.  In  fifteen  years,  i.  e.,  in  1776,  he  grew  up 
to  manhood,  and  declared  himself  free." 

The  next  year  finds  the  same  great  scholar  and  orator 
exposing  himself  to  the  cry  of  "  treason  "  in  denouncing 


A  Century  of  Self- Government — Wintkrop. 


the  idea  of  taxation  without  representation,  and  forth 
with  vindicating  himself  in  a  masterly  pamphlet  which 
excited  the  admiration  and  sympathy  of  the  whole  peo 
ple. 

Another  year  brings  the  first  installment  of  the  scheme 
for  r  .ising  a  revenue  in  the  colonies,  in  the  shape  of 
declaratory  resolves,  and  Otis  meets  it  plum  ply  and 
b  jldly,  in  Faneuil  Hall— at  that  moment  freshly  rebuilt 
and  reopened — with  the  counter  declaration  that  "  every 
British  subject  in  America  is,  of  common  right,  by  act  of 
Parliament,  and  by  the  laws  of  God  and  nature,  entitled 
to  all  the  essential  privileges  of  Britons." 

And  now  George  Grenville  has  devised  and  proposed 
the  Stamp  Act.  And,  before  it  is  even  known  that  the 
bill  had  passed,  Samuel  Adams  is  heard  reading,  in  that 
sameFaueuii  Hall,  at  the  May  meeting  of  1764,  those 
memorable  instructions  from  Boston  to  her  representa 
tives  :  "  There  is  no  room  for  delay.  If  taxes  are  laid 
upon  us  in  any  shape  without  our  having  a  legal  repre 
sentation  where  they  are  laid,  are  we  not  reduced  from 
the  character  of  free  subjects,  to  the  miserable  state  of 
tributary  slaves  ?  *  *  *  We  claim  British  rights,  not 
by  charter  only ;  we  are  born  to  them.  Use  your  en 
deavors  that  the  weight  of  the  other  North  American 
colonies  may  be  added  to  that  of  tbis  province,  that  by 
uuited  application  all  may  happily  obtain  redress."  Re 
dress  and  Union — and  union  as  the  means,  and  the  only 
means,  of  redress — had  thus  early  become  ttie  doctrine 
of  our  Boston  leaders  ;  and  James  Otis  follows  out  that 
doc  nine,  without  a  moment's  delay,  in  another  brilliant 
plea  for  tbe  rights  of  the  colonies. 

The  next  year  finds  the  pen  of  John  Adams  in  motion, 
in  a  powerful  communication  to  the  public  journals,  set 
ting  forth  distinctly  that  "  there  seems  to  be  a  direct  and 
formal  design  on  foot  in  Great  Britain  to  enslave  all 
America"  and  adding  most  ominously  those  emphat!c 
words:  "Be  it  remembered,  liberty  must  be  defended 
at  all  hazards !" 

And,  I  need  not  say,  it  was  remembered,  and  liberty 
was  defended,  at  all  hazards,  here  upon  our  own  soil. 

Ten  long  years,  however,  are  still  to  elapse  before  the 
wager  of  battle  is  to  be  fully  joined.  The  stirring  events 
which  crowded  those  years,  and  which  have  been  so  viv 
idly  depicted  by  Sparks  and  Bancroft  and  Frothingham— 
to  name  no  others— are  too  familiar  for  repetition  or  ref 
erence.  Virginia,  through  the  clarion  voice  of  Patrick 
Henry,  nobly  sustained  by  her  house  of  burgesses,  leads 
off  iu  the  grand  remonstrance.  Massachusetts,  through 
the  trumpet  tones  of  James  Otis,  rouses  the  whole  con 
tinent  by  a  demand  for  a  General  Congress.  South  Ca 
rolina,  through  the  influence  of  Chrieiopher  Gadsden, 
responds  first  to  the  demand.  "  Deep  calleth  unto  deep." 
In  October,  1765,  delegates,  regularly  or  irregularly 
chosen,  from  nine  colonies,  are  in  consultation  at  New- 
York  ;  and  from  South  Carolina  comes  the  watchword  \:.f 
assurred  success  :  •'  There  ought  to  be  no  New-England1 
man,  no  New-Yorker,  known  on  tbe  continent ;  but  all  I 
of  us  Americans." 

Meantime,  the  people  are  everywhere  inflamed  and  j 
maddened  by  the  attempt  to  enforce  the  Stamp  act. 
Everywhere  that  attempt  is  resisted.  Everywhere  it  is 
resolved  that  it  shall  never  be  executed.  It  is  at  length 
repealed,  and  a  momentary  lull  succeeds.  But  the  re 
peal  is  accompanied  by  more  declaratory  resolutions  of 
the  power  of  Parliament  to  tax  the  colonies  "  in  all  cases 
whatsoever  ;  "  and  then  follows  that  train  of  abuses  and 
usurpations  which  Jefferson's  immortal  paper  charges 
upon  the  King,  and  which  the  King  himself  unquestion 
ably  ordered.  "  It  was  to  no  purpose,"  said  Lord  North 
in  1774,  "  making  objections,  for  the  King  would  have 


it  so."  "  The  King,"  said  he,  "  meant  to  try  the  ques 
tion  with  America,"  And  it  is  well  added  by  the  narra 
tor  of  the  anecdote,  "  Boston  seems  to  have  been  the 
place  fixed  upon  to  try  the  question." 

Yes,  at  Boston  the  bolts  of  royal  indignation  are  to  be 
ainiitl  and  winged.  She  has  been  foremost  in  destroying 
the  stamps,  in  defying  the  soldiers,  in  drowning  the  tea. 
Letters,  too,  have  reached  the  Government,  like  those 
which  Rehum  the  Chancellor  and  Shimshai  the  Scribe 
wrote  to  King  Artaxerxes  about  Jerusalem,  calling  this 
"  a  rebellious  city,  and  hurtful  unto  kings  and  provinces, 
and  that  they  have  moved  sedition  within  the  same  of 
old  time,  and  would  not  pay  toll,  tribute  and  custom  ;" 
and  warning  His  Majesty  that,  unless  subdued  and 
crushed,  "  he  would  have  no  portion  on  this  side  the 
river."  In  vain  did  our  eloquent  young  Quincy  pour 
forth  his  burning  words  of  remonstrance.  The  port  of 
Boston  is  closed,  and  her  people  are  to  be  starved  into 
compliance.  Well  did  Boston  say  to  herself,  in  town- 
meeting,  that  "  she  had  been  stationed  by  Providence  in 
the  front  rank  of  the  conflict."  Grandly  has  our  eloquent 
historian,  Bancroft,  said  of  her.  in  a  sentence  which 
sums  up  the  whole  matter,  "  like  the  last  embattling  of 
a  Roman  legion"—"  The  King  set  himself,  and  his  minis 
try,  and  his  Parliament,  and  all  Great  Britain  to  subdue 
to  his  will  one  stubborn  little  town  on  the  sterile  coast  of 
the  Massachusetts  Bay.  The  odds  against  it  were  fear 
ful  ;  but  it  showed  a  life  inextinguishable,  and  had  been 
chosen  to  guard  over  the  liberties  of  mankind  !" 

Generously  and  n(«L>ly  did  the  other  colonies  come  to 
our  aid,  and  the  cause  of  Boston  was  everywhere  ac 
knowledged  to  be  "  the  cause  of  all."  But  we  may  not 
forget  how  peculiarly  it  was  "  the  cause  of  Boston,"  and 
that  here,  on  our  own  Massachusetts  soil,  the  practical 
question  of  independence  was  first  tried  and  virtually 
settled.  Tbe  brave  Col.  Pickering  at  Salem  Bridge,  the 
heroic  minute  men  at  Lexington  and  Concord  Bridge, 
the  gallant  Col.  Prescott  at  Bunker  Hill,  did  their  part  in 
hastening  that  settlement  and  bringing  it  to  a  crisis  ;  and 
when  the  continental  army  was  at  length  brought  to  our 
rescue,  and  the  glorious  Washington,  after  holding  the 
British  forces  at  bay  for  nine  mouths,  had  fairly  driven 
them  from  the  town— though  more  than  three  montha 
were  still  to  intervene  before  the  Declaration  was  to  be 
made— it  could  truly  and  justly  be  said  that  it  was  only 
"  the  declaration  of  a  fact  which  already  exists." 

Indeed,  Massachusetts  had  practically  administered 
"  a  government  independent  of  the  King"  from  the  19th 
of  July,  1775  ;  while  on  the  very  first  day  of  May,  1776, 
her  General  Court  had  passed  a  solemn  act  to  erase  forth 
with  the  name  of  the  King,  and  the  year  of  his  reign, 
from  all  civil  commissions,  writs,  and  precepts,  and  to 
substitute  therefor  "  the  year  of  the  Christian  era  and 
the  name  of  the  government  and  people  of  the  Massa 
chusetts  Bay  in  New-England."  Other  colonies  may 
have  empowered  or  instructed  their  delegates  in  Con 
gress  earlier  than  this  colony  to  act  on  the  subject.  But 
this  was  action  Itself— positive,  decisive,  conclusive  ac 
tion.  The  Declaration  was  made  in  Philadelphia;  but 
the  independence  which  was  declared  can  date  back  no 
where,  for  its  first  existence  as  a  fact,  earlier  than  to 
Massachusetts.  Upon  her  the  lot  fell  "  to  try  the  ques 
tion  ;"  and.  with  the  aid  of  Washington  and  the  Conti 
nental  army,  it  was  tried,  and  tried  triumphantly,  upon 
her  soil.  Certainly,  it  Faneuil  Hall  was  the  cradle  of 
liberty,  the  Old  State  House  was  the  cradle  of  independ 
ence,  and  our  Old  South  the  nursery  of  liberty  and  inde 
pendence  both  ;  and  if  these  sacred  edifices,  all  or  any  of 
them,  are  indeed  destined  to  disappear,  let  us  see  to  it 
that  some  corner  of  then?  sites  at  least  be  consecrated  to 


Independence  Day  Orations,  July  4,  187G. 


monuments  which  shall  toll  their  story,  in  legible  letter 
ing,  to  our  children  and  our  children's  children  forever  ! 

Thank*  be  to  God,  that,  in  his  good  providence,  the 
trial  of  this  great  question  fell  primarily  upon  a  colony 
and  a  people  peculiarly  litted  to  meet  it ;  whose  whole 
condition  and  training  had  prepared  them  for  it,  and 
whose  whole  history  had  pointed  to  it. 

Why,  quaint  old  John  Evelyn,  in  his  delicious  diary, 
tells  us,  under  date  of  May,  1671,  that  the  great  anxiety 
of  the  Council  for  plantations,  of  which  he  had  just  been 
made  a  member,  was  "  to  know  the  condition  of  New- 
England,"  which  appeared  "  to  be  very  independent  as 
to  their  regard  to  Old  England  or  His  Majesty,"  and 
•'  almost  upon  the  very  brink  of  renouncing  any  depend 
ence  upon  the  Crown." 

"  I  have  always  laughed,"  said  John  Adams,  in  a  letter 
to  Beniamin  Rush  in  1807,  "  at  the  affectation  of  repre 
senting  American  Independence  as  a  novel  idea,  as  a 
modern  discovery,  as  a  late  invention.  The  idea  of  it  as  a 
possible  thing,  as  a  probable  event,  as  a  necessary  and 
unavoidable  measure,  ia  ease  Great  Britain  should  as 
sume  an  unconstitutional  authority  over  us,  has  been 
familiar  to  Americans  from  the  first  settlement  of  the 
country,  and  was  well  understood  by  Gov.  Winthrop  in 
1675,  as  by  Gov.  Samuel  Adams,  when  he  told  you  that 
independence  had  been  the  first  wish  of  his  heart  for 
seven  years."  "  The  principles  and  feelings  which  pro 
duced  the  Revolution,"  said  he  again,  in  his  second  letter 
to  Tudor  in  1818,  "  ought  to  be  traced  back  for  two  hun 
dred  years,  and  sought  in  the  history  of  the  country 
from  the  first  plantations  in  America."  The  first  emi 
grants,  he  maintains,  were  the  true  authors  of  our  inde 
pendence,  and  the  men  of  the  revolutionary  period,  him 
self  among  them,  were  only  "  tLe  awakeuers  and  re 
vivers  of  the  original  fundamental  principles  of  col 
onization." 

And  the  accomplished  historian  of  New-England,  Dr. 
Palfrey,  follows  up  the  idea,  and  says  more  precisely : 
"  He  who  well  weighs  the  facts  which  have  been  pre 
sented  in  connection  with  the  principal  emigration  to 
Massachusetts,  and  other  related  facts  which  will 
offer  themselves  to  notice  as  we  proceed,  may  find  him 
self  conducted  to  the  conclusion  that  when  Winthrop  and 
his  associates  (in  1629)  prepared  to  convey  across  the 
water  a  charter  from  the  King  which,  they  hoped,  would 
in  their  beginnings  afford  them  some  protection  both 
from  himself,  and,  throughhim,  from  the  Powers  of  Con 
tinental  Europe,  they  had  conceived  a  project  no  less  im 
portant  than  that  of  laying  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic 
the  foundations  of  a  nation  of  Puritan  Englishmen- 
foundations  to  be  built  upon  as  future  circumstances 
should  decide  or  allow." 

Indeed,  the  transfer  of  their  charter  and  of  their 
"  whole  government  "  to  New-England,  on  their  own  re 
sponsibility,  was  an  act  closely  approaching  to  a  declara 
tion  of  independence,  and  clearly  foreshadowing  it.  And 
when,  only  a  few  years  afterward,  \re  find  the  magis 
trates  and  deputies  resisting  a  demand  for  the  surrender'! 
of  the  charter,  studiously  and  systematically  "  avoiding 
and  protracting"  all  questions  on  the  sut»ject,  and 
"hastening  their  fortifications"  meantime;  and  when 
we  hear  even  the  ministers  of  the  colony  openly  declar 
ing  that,  "Lf  a  General  Governor  were  sent  over  here, 
we  ought  not  to  accept  him,  but  to  defend  our  lawful 
possessions,  if  we  were  able" — we  recognize  a  spirit  and  a 
purpose  which  cannot  be  mistaken.  That  spirit  and  that 
purpose  were  manifested  and  illustrated  in  a  manner 
even  more  marked  and  unequivocal — as  the  late  venera 
ble  Josiah  Quiucy  reminded  the  people  of  Boston,  just 
half  a  century  ago  to-d{%'— when  under  the  lead  of  0110 


who  had  come  over  in  the  ship  with  the  charter,  and  had 
lived  to  be  the  Nestor  of  New-England—Simon  Brad- 
street — "  a  glorious  revolution  was  effected  here  in  Mas 
sachusetts  30  days  before  it  was  known  that  King  Wil 
liam  had  just  effected  a  similar  glorious  revolution  on 
the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic."  New-England,  it  seems, 
with  characteristic  and  commendable  dispatch,  had 
fairly  got  rid  of  Sir  Edmond  Andros  a  month  before  she 
knew  that  Old-England  had  got  rid  of  his  master ! 

But  I  do  not  forget  that  we  must  look  further  back 
than  even  the  earliest  settlement  of  the  American  colo 
nies  for  the  primal  fiat  of  independence.  I  do  not  forget 
that  when  Edmund  Burke,  in  1775,  in  alluding  to  the 
possibility  of  an  American  representation  in  Parliament, 
exclaimed  so  emphatically  and  eloquently,  "  Opposiiit 
nalura—l  cannot  remove  the  external  barriers  of  the 
creation,"  he  had  really  exhausted  the  whole  argument. 
No  effective  representation  was  possible.  If  it  had  been 
possible,  England  herself  would  have  been  aghast  at  it. 
The  very  idea  of  James  Otis  and  Patrick  Henry  and  the 
Adamses  arguing  the  great  questions  of  human  rights 
and  popular  liberty  on  the  floor  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  and  in  the  hearing  of  the  common  people  of  Great 
Britain,  would  have  thrown  the  King  and  Lord  North 
into  convulsions  of  terror,  and  we  should  soon  have 
heard  them  crying  out,  "  These  men  that  have  turned  the 
world  upside  down  are  come  hither  also."  One  of  their 
own  Board  of  Trade  (Soame  Jenyus)  well  said,  with  as 
much  truth  as  humor  or  sarcasm,  "  I  have  lately  seen  so 
many  specimens  of  the  great  powers  of  speech  of  which 
these  American  gentlemen  are  possessed,  that  I  should 
be  afraid  the  sudden  importation  of  so  much  eloquence 
at  once  would  endanger  the  safety  of  England.  It  will 
be  much  cheaper  for  us  to  pay  their  army  than  their  ora 
tors."  But  no  effective  representation  was  possible ; 
and  without  it  taxation  was  tyranny,  in  spite  of  the  great 
dictionary  dogmatist  and  his  insolent  pamphlet. 

Why,  even  in  these  days  of  ocean  steamers,  reducing 
the  passage  across  the  Atlantic  from  forty  or  fifty  or  sixty 
days  to  ten,  representation  in  Westminster  Hall  is  not 
proposed  for  the  colonies  which  England  still  holds  on 
our  continent ;  and  ir  would  be  little  better  than  a  farce 
if  it  were  proposed  and  attempted.  The  Dominion  of 
Canada,  as  we  all  know,  remajua  as  she  is,  seeking  nei 
ther  independence  aor  annexation,  only  because  her 
people  prefer  to  be,  :-.iul  a.c  proud  of  being,  a  part  of  the 
British  Empire;  and  :>'.-<  .m.-,,--.  ih:u  I",  nip  ire  has  abandoned 
all  military  occupation  or  forcible  restraint  upon  them, 
and  has  adopted  a  system  involving  no  collision  or  con 
tention.  Canada  is  now  doubly  a  -nonuaieiit  of  the  great 
ness  and  wisdom  of  the  immortal  (  uatham.  His  military 
policy  oouquered  it  for  England,  and  his  civil  policy, 
"  ruling  from  his  urn,"  and  supplemented  by  that  of  his 
gvoal  son,  hoiuo  it  !>/r  England,  at  this  day, permitting  it 
Substantially  to  ride  itself,  through  the  agency  of  a  Par- 
M:U<K  •;  <>f  its  own,  with,  at  this  moment,  as  it  ha.pi  ens. 

.    .    .,  u 


iin  able,  intelligent,  and  accomplished  Governor-General, 
whose  name  and  blood  were  not  without  close  affinities 
kto  those  of  that  marvelous  statesman  and  orator  while 
he  lived. 

It  did  not  require  the  warning  of  our  example  to  bring 
about  such  results.  It  is  written  in  the  eternal  constitu 
tion  of  things  that  no  large  colonies,  educated  to  a  sense 
of  their  rights  and  capable  of  defending  them— no  En 
glish  or  Anglo-Saxc.fr  colony,  certainly— can  be  gov 
erned  by  a  power  thrc.  thousand  miles  across  an  ocean, 
unless  they  are  governed  to  their  own  satisfaction,  and 
held  as  'colonies  with  their  own  consent  and  free  will. 
An  imperial  military  sway  may  be  as  elastic  and  far- 
reaching  as  the  mngnotic  wires,— it  matters  not  whether 


A  Century  of  Self -Government — Winthrop. 


57 


tbnec  thousand  or  fifteen  thousand  miles — over  an  unciv 
ilized  region  or  an  unenlightened  race.  But  who  is  wild 
enough  to  conceive,  as  Burke  said  a  hundred  years  ago, 
"  that  the  natives  of  Hindostun  and  those  of  Virginia 
could  be  ordered  in  the  same  manner;  or  that  the 
Cutehery  Court  and  tbe  Grand  Jury  at  Salem  could  be 
regulated  on  a  similar  plan?"  "I  am  convinced."  said 
Fox,  in  1701,  in  the  fresh  light  of  the  experience  America 
had  afforded  him,  "  that  the  only  method  of  retaining 
distant  colonies  with  advantage  is  to  enable  them  to 
govern  themselves." 

Yes,  from  the  hour  when  Columbus  and  his  compeers 
discovered  our  continent  its  ultimate  political  de"stiny 
was  fixed.  At  the  very  gateway  of  the  Pantheon  of 
American  liberty  and  American  independence  might 
well  be  seen  a  triple  monument,  like  that  to  the  old  in 
ventors  of  printing  at  Frankfort,  including  Columbus  and 
Americus  Vespucius  and  Cabot.  They  were  the  pioneers 
in  the  march  to  independence.  They  were  the  precursors 
in  the  only  progress  of  freedom  which  was  to  have  no 
backward  steps.  Liberty  had  struggled  long  and  bravely 
in  other  ages  and  in  other  lands,  fe  had  made  glorious 
manifestations  of  its  power  and  promise  in  Athens  and  in 
Rome ;  in  the  medireval  republics  of  Italy  ;  on  the  plains 
of  Germany;  along  the  dykes  of  Holland;  among  the 
icy  fastnesses  of  Switzerland;  and,  more  securely  and 
hopefully  still,  in  the  sea-girt  isle  of  Old  England.  But 
it  was  the  glory  of  those  heroic  old  navigators  to  reveal 
a  standing-place  for  it  at  last,  where  its  lever  could  find 
a  secure  fulcrum,  and  rest  safely  until  it  had  moved  the 
world!  The  fullness  of  time  had  now  come.  Under  an 
impulse  of  religious  conviction,  the  poor  persecuted  Pil 
grims  launched  out  upon  the  stormy  deep  in  a  single, 
leaking,  almost  foundering  bark;  and  in  the  very  cabin 
of  the  Mayflower  the  first  written  compact  of  self- 
government  in  the  history  of  mankind  is  prepared  and 
signed.  Ten  years  afterward  the  Massachusetts  Company 
come  over  with  their  charter,  and  administer  it  on 
the  avowed  principle  that  the  whole  government,  civil 
and  religious,  is  transferred.  All  the  rest  which  is  to 
follow  until  the  4th  of  July,  177C,  is  only  matter  of  time 
and  opportunity.  Certainly,  uiy  friends,  as  we  look  back 
to-day  through  the  long  vista  of  the  p-.ist.  we  perceive 
that  it  was  no  mere  declaration  of  men  which  "primarily 
brought  about  the  independence  we  celebrate.  We  can 
not  but  reverently  rc-C'»giii/e-  the  hand  of  that  Almighty 
Maker  of  the  World  who  "  f  >un<le<i  it  upon  f.ne  seas  and 
established  it  upon  the  floods,"  We  cannot  but  feel  the 
full  force  and  felicity  ot :  those  opening  -words  in  which 
the  Declaration  speaks  of  our  assuming  aipouer  the  pow 
ers  of  toe  earth  "  that  separate  and  equal  station  to 
which  the  laws  of  >  ;I!LIKV  and  of  Nature's  God  entitled 
us." 

I  spoke,  Mr.  M;>-.  •>:•  at  the  IIF  oivtt'on,  of  '    \ 

Century    of    Self-'-  .••  c vnr-u -'i?    Completed."      And  ^o, 
some  sort,  it  is.    Tt.e,  "Deeiaration  at  Philadelphia  was,  in? 
itscli,   both  an   a^<  "iion  ;)>c\  m  net  of  self-government: 
and  it  Lad  been  j-,  n  wis  immediately  followed, 

by  provisions  for  It  -  ^  K'-go voninvnt  in  all  the  sepa 
rate  colonies-  South  C.u  ..i.i:a  haviiu:  led  the  way,  condi 
tionally  at  least,  as  early  is  tlje  2(?th  of  March.  But  we 
infiy  not  forget  that  six  or  seven  years  of  hard  fighting 
are  still  to  intervene  before,  qjrr  indei  endence  is  to  be 
acknowledged  by  Great  Britain ,'jiu'l  six  or  seven  years 
more  before  the  full  cousir.i.manoi:  will  have  been 
reached  by  the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitution  and 
the  organization  of  our  National  system  under  the  august 
and  transcendent  Presidency  of  Washington. 

With  that  august  and  transcendent  Presidency,  dating 
— as  it  is  pleasant  to  remember — precisely  a  hundred 


years  from  the  analogous  accession  of  William  of  Orange 
to  the  throne  of  England,  our  history  as  an  organized 
nation  fairly  begins.  When  that  centennial  anniversary 
shall  arrive,  thirteen  years  hence,  the  time  may  have 
come  for  a  full  review  of  our  National  career  and  charac 
ter,  and  for  a  complete  computation  or  a  iust  estimate  of 
what  a  century  of  self-government  has  accomplished  for 
ourselves  and  for  mankind. 

1  dared  not  attempt  such  a  review  to-day.  This  anni 
versary  has  seemed  to  me  to  belong  peculiarly — I  had 
almost  said  sacredly — to  the  men  and  the  events  which 
rendered  the  Fourth  of  July  so  memorable  forever ;  and 
I  have  willingly  left  myself  but  little  time  for  anything 
else.  God  grant  that  when  the  30th  of  April,  1889 
shall  dawn  upon  those  of  us  who  may  live  to  see  it,  the 
thick  clouds  which  now  darken  our  political  sky  may 
have  passed  away;  that  wholesome  and  healing  counsels 
may  have  prevailed  throughout  our  land;  that  integrity 
and  purity  may  be  once  more  conspicuous  in  our  high 
places;  that  an  honest  currency  may  have  been  re 
established,  and  prosperity  restored  to  all  branches  of 
our  domestic  industry  and  our  foreign  commerce,  and 
that  some  of  those  social  problems  which  are  perplexing 
and  tormenting  so  many  of  our  Southern  States  may 
have  been  safely  and  satisfactorily  solved! 

For  indeed,  fellow-citizens,  we  cannot  shut  our  eyes  to 
the  fact  that  this  great  year  of  our  Lord  and  of  American 
liberty  has  been  ushered  in  by  not  a  few  discouraging 
and  depressing  circumstances.  Appalling  catastrophes, 
appalling  crimes,  have  marked  its  course.  Financial, 
political,  moral  delinquencies  and  wrongs  have  swept 
over  our  laud  like  an  Arctic  or  an  Antartic  wave,  or  both 
conjoined,  until  we  have  been  almost  ready  to  cry  out  in 
anguish  to  Heaven,  "  Thou  hast  multiplied  the  nation 
but  not  increased  the  joy !"  It  will  be  an  added  stigma, 
in  all  time  to  come,  on  the  corruption  of  the  hour,  and  on 
all  concerned  in  it,  that  it  has  cast  so  deep  a  shade  over 
our  Centennial  festival. 

All  this,  however,  we  are  persuaded,  is  temporary  and 
exceptional— the  result,  not  of  our  institutions,  but  of 
disturbing  causes,  and  as  distinctly  traceable  to  those 
causes  as  the  scoria  of  a  volcano  or  the  debris  of  a 
deluge.  Had  there  been  no  long  and  demoralizing  civil 
war  to  account  for  such  developments,  we  might  indeed 
be  alarmed  for  our  future.  As  it  is,  our  confidence  in 
the  Republic  is  unshaken.  We  are  ready  even  to  accept 
all  that  has  occurred  to  overshadow  our  jubilee,  as  a  sea 
sonable  warning  against  vainglorious  boastings;  as  a 
timely  admonition  that  our  institutions  are  not  proof 
against  licentiousness  and  profligacy,  but  that  "  eternal 
vigilance  is  still  the  price  of  liberty." 

Already  the  reaction  has  commenced.  Already  the 
people  are  everywhere  roused  to  the  importance  of 
something  higher  than  mere  partisan  activity  and  zeal, 
and  to  a  sense  that  something  beside  "  big  wars"  may  be 
required  to  "make  ambition  virtue."  Every  where  the 
idea  is  scouted  that  there  are  any  immunities  or  impuni- 
CTfes  for  bribery  and  corruption  :  and  the  scorn  of  the 
v  hole  people  is  deservedly  cast  on  any  one  detected  in 
t)luckiag  our  eagle's  wings  to  feather  his  own  nest. 
Everywhere  there  is  a  demand  for  integrity,  for  princi 
ple,  for  character,  as  the  only  safe  Qualifications  for  pub 
lic  employments  as  well  as  for  private  trusts.  Oh,  let 
that  demand  be  enforced  and  insisted  on— as  I  hope  and 
believe  it  will  be — and  we  shall  have  nothing  to  fear  for 
our  freedom,  and  but  little  to  regret  in  the  temporary  de 
pression  and  inertification  which  have  recalled  us  to  a 
deeper  sense  of  our  dangers  and  our  duties. 

Meantime  we  may  be  moro  than  content  that  no  short 
comings  or  failures'  of  our  own  day  can  diminish  tan 


58 


Independence  Day  Orations.  July  4.  1S7G. 


glories  of  the  past  or  dim  the  brilliancy  of  successes 
achieved  by  our  fathers.  We  can  look  back  upon  our 
history  so  far  and  find  iu  it  enough  to  make  us  grateful, 
enough  to  make  us  hopeful,  enough  to  make  us  proud  of 
our  institutions  and  of  our  country,  enough  to  make  us 
resolve  never  to  despair  of  the  Republic,  enough  to  assure 
us  that,  could  our  fathers  look  down  on  all  which  has 
been  accomplished,  they  would  feel  that  their  toils  and 
sacrifices  had  not  been  in  vain ;  enough  to  convince  other 
nations  and  the  world  at  large  that,  in  uniting  so  gener 
ously  with  us  to  decorate  our  grand  Exposition  and  cele 
brate  our  Centennial  birthdav,  they  are  swelling  the  tri 
umphs  of  a  people  and  power  which  have  left  no  doubt 
ful  impress  upon  the  hundred  years  of  their  independent 
national  existence. 

Those  hundred  years  have  been  crowded,  as  we  all 
know, with  wonderful  changes  in  all  quarters  of  the  globe. 
I  would  not  disparage  or  depreciate  the  interest  and  im 
portance  of  the  great  events  and  great  reforms  which 
have  been  witnessed  during  their  progress,  and  especi 
ally  near  their  end,  in  almost  every  country  of  the  Old 
World.  Nor  would  I  presume  to  claim  too  confidently 
for  the  closing  century  that  when  the  records  of  mankind 
are  made  up  in  some  far  distant  future  it  will  be  remem 
bered  and  designated,  peculiarly  and  preeminently,  as 
the  American  age.  Yet  it  may  well  be  doubted  whether 
the  dispassionate  historian  of  after  years  will  find  that 
the  influences  ot  any  other  nation  have  been  of  further 
reach  and  wider  range  or  of  more  efficiency  for  the  wel 
fare  of  the  world  than  those  of  our  great  Republic  since 
it  had  a  name  and  a  place  on  the  earth. 

Other  ages  have  had  their  designations,  local  or  per 
sonal  or  mythical— historic  or  prehistoric— ages  of  stone 
or  iron,  of  silver  or  gold  ;  ages  of  kings  or  queens,  of  re 
formers  or  conquerors.  Tbat  marvelous  compound  of 
almost  everything  wise  or  foolish,  noble  or  base,  witty  or 
ridiculous,  sublime  or  profane,  Voltaire,  maintained  that, 
in  his  day,  no  man  of  reflection  or  of  taste  could  count 
more  than  four  authentic  ages  in  the  history  of  the 
world :  1.  That  of  Philip  and  Alexander,  with  Pericles 
and  Demosthenes,  Aristotle  and  Plato,  Apelles,  Phidias, 
and  Praxiteles  ;  2.  That  of  Caesar  and  Augustus,  with 
Lucretius  and  Cicero  and  Livy,  Virgil  and  Horace,  Varro 
and  Vitruvius  ;  3.  That  of  the  Medici,  with  Michael  An- 
gelo  and  Raphael,  Galileo  and  Dante  ;  4.  That  which  he 
was  at  the  moment  engaged  in  depicting— the  age  of 
Louis  XIV.,  which,  in  his  judgment,  surpassed  all  the 
others ! 

Our  American  age  could  bear  no  comparison  with  aares 
like  these— measured  only  by  the  brilliancy  of  historians 
and  philosophers,  of  poets  or  painters.  We  need  not,  in 
deed,  be  ashamed  of  what  has  been  done  for  literature 
and  science  and  art,  during  these  hundred  years,  nor 
hesitate  to  point  with  pride  to  oar  own  authors  and  ar 
tists,  living  and  dead.  But  the  day  has  gone  by  when 
literature  and  the  fine  arts,  or  even  science  and  the  use-- 
f  ul  arts,  can  characterize  an  age.  There  are  other  an/l 
higher  measures  of  comparison.  And  the  very  nation 
which  counts  Voltaire  among  its  greatest  celebrities — the 
nation  which  aided  us  so  generously  in  our  Revolution 
ary  struggle,  and  which  is  now  rejoicing  in  its  own  sui 
cessful  establishment  of  republican  institutions— the 
land  of  the  great  and  good  Lafayette,  has  taken  the  lead 
in  pointing  out  the  true  grounds  on  which  our  American 
age  may  challenge  and  claim  a  special  recognition.  An 
association  of  Frenchmen,  under  the  lead  of  some  of 
their  most  distinguished  statesmen  and  scholars,  has 
proposed  to  erect,  and  is  engaged  in  erecting,  as  their 
contribution  to  our  Centennial,  a  gigantic  statue  at  the 
very  throat  of  the  harbor  of  our  supreme  commercial 


emporium,  which  shall  symbolize  the  legend  inscribed  oa 
its  pedestal,  "  Liberty  enlightening  the  World!" 

That  glorious  legend  presents  the  standard  by  which 
our  age  is  to  be  judged,  and  by  which  we  may  well  be 
willing  and  proud  to  have  it  judged.  All  else  in  our  own 
career,  certainly,  is  secondary.  The  growth  and 
grandeur  of  our  territorial  dimensions,  the  multiplica 
tion  of  our  States,  the  number  and  size  and  wealth  of  our 
cities,  the  marvelous  increase  of  our  population,  the 
measureless  extent  of  our  railways  and  internal  naviga 
tion,  our  overflowing  granaries,  our  inexhaustible  mines, 
our  countless  inventions  and  multitudinous  industries- 
all  these  may  be  remitted  to  the  census  and  left  for  the 
students  of  statistics.  The  claim  which  our  country  pre 
sents,  for  giving  no  second  or  subordinate  ^character  to 
the  age  which  has  just  closed,  rests  only  on  what  has 
been  accomplished,  at  home  and  abroad,  for  elevating 
the  condition  of  mankind,  for  advancing  political  and  hu 
man  freedom,  for  promoting  the  greatest  good  of  the 
greatest  number,  and  for  "enlightening  the  world"  by 
the  example  of  a  rational,  regulated,  enduring  constitu 
tional  liberty,  And1*  who  will  dispute  or  question  that 
claim  ?  In  what  region  of  the  earth  ever  so  remote  from 
us,  in  what  corner  of  creation  ever  so  far  out  of  the 
range  of  our  communication,  does  not  some  burden  light 
ened,  some  bond  loosened,  some  yoke  lifted,  some  labor 
better  remunerated,  some  new  hope  for  despairing 
hearts,  some  new  light  or  new  liberty  for  the  benighted 
or  the  depressed,  bear  witness  this  day,  and  trace  itself, 
directly  or  indirectly,  back  to  the  impulse  given  to  the 
world  by  the  successful  establishment  and  operation  of 
free  institutions  on  this  American  continent? 

How  many  colonies  have  been  more  wisely  and  hu 
manely  and  liberally  administered  under  the  warning  of 
our  Revolution!  How  many  churches  have  abated  some 
thing  of  their  old  intolerance  and  bigotry,  under  the  en 
croachment  of  our  religious  freedom !  Who  believes  or 
imagines  that  free  schools,  a  free  press,  the  elective 
franchise,  the  rights  of  representation,  the  principles  of 
constitutional  government,  would  have  made  the  notable 
progress  that  they  have  made,  had  our  example  been 
wanting!  Who  believes  or  imagines  that  even  the  rot 
ten  boroughs  of  old  England  would  have  disappeared  sa 
rapidly  had  there  been  no  American  representative  re 
public  !  And  has  there  been  a  more  effective  influence 
on  human  welfare  and  human  freedom  since  the  world 
began  than  that  which  has  resulted  from  the  existence 
of  a  great  land  of  liberty  in  this  Western  Hemisphere,  of 
unbounded  resources,  with  acres  enough  for  a  myriad  of 
homes,  and  with  a  welcome  lor  all  who  may  fly  to  it  from 
oppression  from  every  region  beneath  the  sun  1 

Let  not  our  example  be  perverted  or  dishonored,  by 
others  or  by  ourselves.  It  was  no  wild  breaking  away 
from  all  authority,  which  we  celebrate  to-day.  It  was  no 
mad  revolt  against  everything  like  government.  No  in 
cendiary  torch  can  be  rightly  kindled  at  our  flame. 
Doubtless  there  had  been  excesses  and  violences  in  many 
quarters  of  our  land— irrepressible  outbreaks  under  un 
bearable  provocations—"  irregular  things,  done  in  the 
confusion  of  mighty  troubles."  Doubtless  our  Boston 
mobs  did  not  always  move  "  to  the  Dorian  mood  of  flutes 
and  soft  recorders."  But  in  all  our  deliberative  assem 
blies,  in  all  our  town  meetings,  in  all  our  Provincial  and 
Continental  Congresses,  there  was  a  respect  for  the 
great  principles  of  law  and  order ;  and  the  definition  of 
true  civil  liberty,  which  had  been  so  remarkably  laid 
down  by  one  of  the  founders  of  our  Common  wealth,  more 
than  a  century  before,  was,  consciously  or  uncon 
sciously,  recognized—"  a  Liberty  for  that  only  which  is 
good,  just,  and  honest."  The  Declaration  wo  commemo- 


A  Century  of  Self -Government.— Winthrop. 


59 


rate  expressly  admitted  and  asserted  that  "  governments 
long  established  should  not  be  changed  for  light  and 
transient  causes."  It  dictated  no  special  forms  of  gov 
ernment  for  other  people,  and  hardly  for  ourselves.  It 
had  no  denunciations,  or  even  disparagements,  for  mon 
archies  or  for  empires,  but  eagerly  contemplated,  as  we 
do  at  this  hour,  alliances  and  friendly  relations  with 
both.  We  have  welcomed  to  our  Jubilee,  with  peculiar 
interest  and  gratification,  the  representatives  of  the  na 
tions  of  Europe— all  then  monarchical— to  whom  we  were 
so  deeply  indebted  for  sympathy  and  for  assistance  in 
our  struggle  for  independence.  We  have  welcomed,  too, 
the  personal  presence  of  an  Emperor,  from  another  quar 
ter  of  our  own  hemisphere,  of  whose  eager  and  en 
lightened  interest  in  education  and  literature  and 
science  we  had  learned  so  much  from  our  lamented  Agas- 
siz,  and  have  now  witnessed  so  much  for  ourselves. 

Our  fathers  were  no  propagandists  of  republican  in 
stitutions  in  the  abstract.  Their  own  adoption  of  a 
republican  form  was,  at  the  moment,  almost  as  much 
a  matter  of  chance  as  of  choice,  of  necessity  as  of  prefer 
ence.  The  Thirteen  Colonies  had,  happily,  been  too  long 
accustomed  to  manage  their  own  affairs,  and  were  too 
wisely  jealous  of  each  other,  also,  to  admit  for  an  instant 
any  idea  of  centralization  ;  and  without  centralization  a 
monarchy,  or  any  other  form  of  arbitrary  government, 
was  out  of  the  question.  Union  was  then,  as  it  is  now, 
the  only  safety  for  liberty  ;  but  it  could  be  only  a  Con 
stitutional  Union,  a  limited  and  restricted  Union, 
founded  on  compromises  and  mutual  concessions ;  a 
Union  recognizing  a  large  measure  of  State  rights — 
resting  not  only  on  the  division  of  powers  among  legis 
lative  and  executive  departments,  but  resting  also  on 
the  distribution  of  powers  between  the  States  and  the 
nation,  both  deriving  their  original  authority  from  the 
people,  and  exercising  that  authority  for  the  people. 
This  was  the  system  contemplated  by  the  Declaration  of 
1776.  This  was  the  system  approximated  to  by  the  Con 
federation  of  1778-81.  This  was  the  system  finally  con 
summated  by  the  Constitution  of  1789.  And  under  this 
system  our  great  example  of  self-government  has  been 
held  up  before  the  nations,  fulfilling,  so  far  as  it  has  ful 
filled  it,  that  lofty  mission  which  is  recognized  to-d?.y  as 
"  Liberty  enlightening  the  World  !" 

Let  me  not  speak  of  that  example  in  any  va'in- 
glorious  spirit.  Let  me  not  seem  to  arrogate  for 
my  country  anything  of  superior  wisdom  or  virtue. 
Who  will  pretend  that  we  have  always  made  the  most 
of  our  independence  or  the  best  of  our  liberty?  Who 
will  maintain  that  we  have  always  exhibited  the  bright 
est  side  of  our  institutions  or  always  intrusted  their  ad 
ministration  to  the  wisest  or  worthiest  men  ?  Who  will 
deny  that  we  have  sometimes  taugut  the  world  what  to 
avoid,  as  well  as  what  to  imitate :  and  that  the  cause  of 
freedom  and  reform  has  sometimes  been  discouraged  and 
put  back  by  our  short-comings,  or  by  our  excesses  t  Our 
light  has  been  at  best  but  a  revolving  light,  warning  by 
its  darker  intervals  or  by  its  somber  shades,  as  well  as 
cheering  by  its  flashes  of  brilliancy,  or  by  the  clear  lus 
ter  of  its  steadier  shining.  Yet,  in  spite  of  all  its  imper 
fections  and  irregularities,  to  no  other  earthly  light  have 
so  many  eyes  been  turned ;  from  no  other  earthly  illumi 
nation  have  so  many  hearts  drawn  hope  and  courage. 
It  has  breasted  the  tides  of  sectional  and  party  strife. 
It  has  stood  the  shock  of  foreign  and  of  civil  war.  It 
\\  ill  still  hold  on,  erect  andunextiuguished,  defying  "  the 
returning  wave"  of  demoralization  and  corruption.  Mil 
lions  of  young  hearts,  in  all  quarters  of  our  land,  are 
awaking  at  this  moment  to  the  responsibility  which  rests 
peculiarly  upon  them,  for  rendering  its  radiance  purer 


and  brighter  and  more  constant ;  and  are  resolvtag  thatr 
it  shall  not  be  their  fault  if  it  do  not  stand  for  a  century 
to  come,  as  it  has  stood  for  a  century  past,  a  beacon  of 
liberty  to  mankind!  With  those  young  hearts  it  is  safe. 
Meantime,  we  may  all  rejoice  and  take  courage,  as  we 
remember  of  how  great  a  drawback  and  obstruction  our 
example  has  been  disembarassed  and  relieved  within  a 
few  years  past.  Certainly,  we  cannot  forget,  this  day,  in 
looking  back  over  the  century  which  is  gone,  how  long 
that  example  was  overshadowed,  in  the  eyes  of  all  men, 
by  the  existence  of  African  Slavery  in  so  considerable  a 
portion  of  our  country.  Never,  never,  however— it  may 
be  safely  said— was  there  a  more  tremendous,  a  more 
dreadful,  problem  submitted  to  a  nation  for  solution,  than 
that  which  this  institution  involved  for  the  United  Statse 
of  America.  Nor  were  we  alone  responsible  for  its  exist 
ence.  I  do  not  speak  of  it  in  the  way  of  apology  for  our 
selves.  Still  less  would  I  refer  to  it  in  the  way  of  crimi 
nation  or  reproach  toward  others,  abroad  or  at  home. 
But  the  well-known  paragraph  on  this  subject,  in  the 
original  draft  of  the  Declaration,  is  quite  too  notable  a 
reminiscence  of  the  little  desk  before  me,  to  be  forgotten 
on  such  an  occasion  as  this.  That  omitted  clause,  which, 
as  Mr.  Jefferson  tells  us,  "  was  struck  out  in  complais 
ance  to  South  Carolina  and  Georgia,"  not  without  "ten 
derness,''  too,  as  he  adds,  to  some  "  Northern  brethren 
who,  though  they  had  very  few  slaves  themselves,  had 
been  pretty  considerable  carriers  of  them  to  others,"— 
contained  the  direct  allegation  that  the  King  had  "  pros 
tituted  his  negative  for  suppressing  every  legislative 
attempt  to  prohibit  or  restrain  this  execrable 
commerce."  That  memorable  clause,  omitted  for  pru 
dential  reasons  only,  has  passed  into  history,  and  its 
truth  can  never  be  disputed.  It  recalls  to  us,  and  recalls 
to  the  world,  the  historical  fact — which  we  certainly 
have  a  special  right  to  remember  this  day — that  not  only 
had  African  slavery  found  its  portentous  and  pernicious 
way  into  our  colonies  in  their  very  earliest  settlement,, 
but  that  it  had  been  fixed  and  fastened  upon  some  of 
them  by  royal  vetoes,  prohibiting  the  passage  of  laws  to 
restrain  its  further  introduction.  It  had  thus  not  only 
entwined  and  entangled  itself  about  the  very  roots  of 
our  choicest  harvests — until  slavery  and  cotton 
at  last  seemed  as  inseparable  as  the  tares  and 
wheat  of  the  sacred  parable— but  it  had  engrafted 
itself  upon  the  very  fabric  of  our  Government.  We  all 
know,  the  world  knows,  that  our  Independence  could 
not  have  been  achieved,  our  Union  could  not  have  been 
maintained,  our  Constitution  could  not  have  been 
established,  without  the  adoption  of  those  compromises 
which  recognized  its  continued  existence,  and  left  it  to 
the  responsibility  of  the  States  of  which  it  was  the 
grievous  inheritance.  And  from  that  day  forward,  the 
method  of  dealing  with  it,  of  disposing  of  it,  and  of  ex 
tinguishing  it,  .became  more  and  more  a  problem  full  of 
corrible  perplexity,  and  seemingly  incapable  of  human 
soJiition. 

Oh,  that  it  could  have  been  solved  at  last  by  some  pro- 
c  -SS  less  deplorable  and  dreadful  than  Civil  War  !  How 
unspeakably  glorious  it  would  have  been  for  us  this  day, 
could  the  Great  Emancipation  have  been  concerted,  ar 
ranged,  and  ultimately  effected,  without  violence  or 
bloodshed,  as  a  simple  and  sublime  act  of  philanthrophy 
and  justice  ! 

But  it  was  not  in  the  divine  economy  that  so  huge  an 
original  wrong  should  be  righted  by  any  easy  process. 
The  decree  seems  to  have  gone  forth  from  the  very  regis 
tries  of  heaven : 

"  Cuncta  prius  tentanda,  seel  immedicabLle  vuluua 
Ense  recideudum  est." 


60 


Independence  Dai/  Orations,  July  4,  187G. 


The  immedicable  wound  must  be  cut  away  by  the 
sword  !  Again  and  again  as  that  terrible  war  went  on, 
we  might  almost  hear  voices  crying  out,  in  the  words  of 
the  old  prophet :  "  O  thou  sword  of  the  Lord,  how  long 
•will  it  foe  ere  thou  be  quiet?  Put  up  thyself  into  thy 
scabbard ;  rest,  and  be  still ! "  But  the  answering  voice 
seemed  not  less  audible :  "  How  can  it  be  quiet,  seeing 
the  Lord  hath  given  it  a  charge  1 " 

But,  thanks  be  to  God,  who  overrules  everything  for 
good,  that  great  event,  the  greatest  of  our  American  age 
—great  enough,  alone  and  by  itself,  to  give  a  name  and  a 
character  to  any  age— has  been  accomplished  ;  and.  by 
His  blessing,  we  present  our  country  to  the  world  this 
day  without  a  slave,  white  or  black,  upon  its  soil  ! 
Thanks  be  to  God  not  only  that  our  beloved  Union  has  been 
saved,  but  that  it  has  been  made  both  easier  to  save  and 
better  worth  saving  hereafter  by  the  final  solution  of  a 
problem  before  which  all  human  wisdom  had  stood 
aghast  and  confounded  for  so  many  generations !  Thanks 
be  to  God,  and  to  Him  be  all  the  praise  and  the  glory,  we 
can  read  the  great  words  of  the  Declaration  on  this  Cen 
tennial  anniversary,  without  reservation  or  evasion  : 
'•  We  hold  these  truths  to  be  self-evident,  that  all  men  are 
created  equal,  and  that  they  are  endowed  by  their  Cre 
ator  with  certain  unalienable  rights  ;  that  among  these 
are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness."  The  le 
gend  on  that  new  colossal  Pharos  at  Long  Island  may 
now  indeed  be,  "  Liberty  enlightening  the  world." 

VII. 
DUTIES  OF  THE  FUTURE. 

We  come,  then,  to-day,  fellow-citizens,  with  hearts  full 
of  gratitude  to  God  and  man,  to  pass  down  our  country 
and  its  institutions— not  wholly  without  scars  and  blem 
ishes  upon  their  front— not  without  shadows  on  the  past 
or  clouds  on  the  future— but  freed  forever  from  at  least 
one  great  stam,  and  firmly  rooted  in  the  love  and  loyalty 
of  a  united  people— to  the  generations  which  are  to  suc 
ceed  us. 

And  what  shall  we  say  to  those  succeeding  generations 
as  we  commit  the  sacred  trust  to  their  keeping  and 
guardianship  1  If  I  could  hope  without  presumption 
that  any  humble  counsels  of  mine  on  this  hallowed  anni 
versary  could  be  remembered  beyond  the  hour  of  their 
utterance,  and  reach  the  ears  of  my  countrymen  in 
future  days  ;  if  I  could  borrow  "  the  masterly  pen  "  of 
Jefferson,  and  produce  words  which  should  partake  of 
the  immortality  of  those  which  he  wrote  on  this  little 
desk ;  if  I  could  command  the  matchless  tongue  of  John 
Adams,  when  he  poured  out  appeals  and  arguments 
which  moved  men  from  their  seats,  and  settled  the  des 
tinies  of  a  nation ;  if  I  could  catch  but  a  single  spark  of 
those  electric  fires  which  Franklin  wrested  from  the 
skies,  and  flash  down  a  phrase,  a  word,  a  thought,  along 
the  magic  chords  which  stretch  across  the  ocean  of  the 
future — what  could  I,  what  would  I  say  ? 

I  could  not  omit,  certainly,  to  reiterate  the  solemn 
obligations  which  rest  on  every  citizen  of  this  Republic 
to  cherish  and  enforce  the  great  principles  of  fair 
Colonial  and  Revolutionary  Fathers — the  principles  of 
Liberty  and  Law,  one  and  inseparable — the  principles  of 
the  Constitution  and  the  Union. 

I  could  not  omit  to  urge  on  every  man  to  remember 
that  self-government  politically  can  only  be  successful 
if  it  be  accompanied  by  self-government  personally ; 
that  there  must  be  government  somewhere  ;  and  that,  if 
tfce  people  are  indeed  to  bo  sovereigns,  they  must  exer 
cise  their  sovereignty  ovor  themselves  individually,  as 
well  as  over  themselves  in  the  aggregate— regulating 
theiv  own  lives,  re  sip  ting  their  own  temptation  s,  subdu 


ing  their  own  passions,  and  voluntarily  Imposing  upon 
themselves  some  measure  of  that  restraint  and  disci 
pline,  which,  under  other  systems,  is  supplied  from  the 
armories  of  arbitrary  power — the  discipline  of  virtue,  in 
the  place  of  the  discipline  of  slavery, 

I  could  not  omit  to  caution  them  against  the  corrupting 
influences  of  intemperance,  extravagance,  and  luxury. 
I  could  not  omit  to  warn  them  against  political  intrigue, 
as  well  as  against  personal  licentiousness  ;  and  to  im 
plore  them  to  regard  principle  and  character,  rather  than 
mere  party  allegiance,  in  the  choice  of  men  to  rule  over 
them. 

I  could  not  omit  to  call  upon  them  to  foster  and  further 
the  cause  of  universal  Education  ;  to  give  a  liberal  sup 
port  to  our  schools  and  colleges ;  to  promote  the  ad 
vancement  of  science  and  art,  in  all  their  multiplied  di 
visions  and  relations  ;  and  to  encourage  and  sustain  all 
those  noble  institutions  of  charity,  which,  in  our  own 
land  above  all  others,  have  given  the  crowning  grace  and 
glory  to  modern  civilization. 

I  could  not  refrain  from  pressing  upon  them  a  just  and 
generous  consideration  for  the  interests  and  the  rights  of 
their  fellow  men  everywhere,  and  an  earnest  effort  to 
promote  peace  and  good  will  among  the  nations  of  the 
earth. 

I  could  not  refrain  from  reminding  them  of  the  shame, 
the  unspeakable  shame  and  ignominy,  which  would  at 
tach  to  those  who  should  show  themselves  unable  to  up 
hold  the  glorious  fabric  of  self-government  which  had 
been  founded  for  them  at  such  a  cost  by  their  Fathers  : 
"  Ytdcte,  videte,  nc,  ut  illis  pulclicrrimum  fiiit  tantam 
vobis  imperil  gloriam  relinqiiere,  sic  vobis  turpissimum 
sit,  illud  quod  accepistis,  tueri  et  conservare  non  posse  !" 

And  surely,  most  surely,  I  could  not  fail  to  invoke 
them  to  imitate  and  emulate  the  examples  of  virtue  and 
purity  and  patriotism,  which  the  great  founders  of  our 
Colonies  and  of  our  nation  had  so  abundantly  left  them. 

VIII. 
WHAT  ARE   GREAT   MEN  ? 

But  could  I  stop  there  1  Could  I  hold  out  to  them,  as 
the  results  of  a  long  life  of  observation  and  experience, 
nothing  but  the  principles  and  examples  of  great  men  ? 

Who  and  what  are  great  men  1  "  Woe  to  the  country," 
said  Metternich  to  our  own  Ticknor,  forty  years  ago, 
"  whose  condition  and  institutions  no  longer  produce 
great  men  to  manage  its  affairs."  The  wily  Austrian  ap 
plied  his  remark  to  England  at  that  day;  but  his  woe— if 
it  be  a  woe— would  have  a  wider  range  in  our  time,  and 
leave  hardly  any  land  unreached.  Cortainly  we  hear  it 
nowadays,  at  every  turn,  that  never  before  has  there 
been  so  striking  a  disproportion  between  supply  and  de 
mand  as  at  this  moment,  the  world  over,  in  .the  com 
modity  of  great  men. 

But  who,  and  what,  are  great  men  1  "  And  now  stand 
forth,"  says  an  eminent  Swiss  historian,  who  had  com 
pleted  a  survey  of  the  whole  history  of  mankind,  at  the 
very  moment  when,  as  he  says,  "  a  blaze  of  freedom  is 
just  bursting  forth  beyond  the  ocean,"—"  And  now  stand 
forth,  ye  gigantic  forms,  shades  of  the  first  C^Jeftains, 
and  Sons  of  Gods,  who  glimmer  among  the  rocky  halls 
rnd  mountain  fortresses  of  the  ancient  world  ;  'and  you, 
Conquerors  of  the  world  from  Babylon  and  from  Mace 
donia;  ye  Dynasties  of  Caesars,  of  Huns,  Arabs,  Moguls, 
and  Tartars ;  ye  Commanders  of  the  Faithful  on  the 
Tigris,  and  Commanders  of  the  Faithful  on  the  Tiber  ; 
you  hoary  Counselors  of  Kings,  and  Peers  of  Sovereigns ; 
Warriors  on  the  car  of  triumph,  covered  with  scars,  and 
crowned  with  laurels;  ye  long  rows  of  Consuls  and  Dic 
tators  famed  for  your  lofty  miml.s,  your  unshaken  con- 


The  National  Ode— -Bayard  Taylor. 


61 


stati cy,  your  ungovernable  spirit,  stand  forth,  and  let  us 
survey  for  awhile  your  assembly,  like  a  council  of  the 
Gods!  What  were  ye?  The  first  among  mortals?  Sel 
dom  can  you  claim  that  title !  The  best  of  men  ?  Still 
fewer  of  you  have  deserved  such  praise  !  Were  ye  the 
compellers,  the  instigators  of  the  human  race,  the  prime 
movers  of  all  their  works  ?  Rather  let  us  say  that  you 
were  the  instruments,  that  you  were  the  wheels,  by 
whose  means  the  Invisible  Being  has  conducted  the  in 
comprehensible  fabric  of  universal  government  across 
the  ocean  of  time  I" 

Instruments  and  wheels  of  the  Invisible  Governor  of 
the  Universe !  This  is  indeed  all  which  the  greatest  of 
men  ever  have  been,  or  ever  can  be.  No  flatteries  of 
courtiers ;  no  adulations  of  the  multitude;  no  audacity  of 
self-reliance ;  no  intoxications  of  success ;  no  evolutions 
or  developments  of  science — can  make  more  or  other  of 
them.  This  is  "  the  sea-mark  of  their  utmost  sail"— the 
goal  of  their  furthest  run— the  very  round  and  top  of 
their  highest  soaring. 

Oh,  if  there  could  be,  to-day,  a  deeper  and  more  per 
vading  impression  of  this  great  truth  throughout  our 
land,  and  a  more  prevailing  conformity  of  our  thoughts 
and  words  and  acts  to  the  lessons  which  it  involves  ;  if 
we  could  lift  ourselves  to  a  loftier  sense  of  our  relations 
to  the  Invisible ;  if,  in  surveying  our  past  history,  we 
could  catch  larger  and  more  ex  Ited  views  of  our  des 
tinies  and  our  responsibilities  ;  if  we  could  realize  that 
the  want  of  good  men  may  be  a  heavier  woe  to  a  land 
than  any  want  of  what  the  world  ealls  great  men,  our 
Centennial  Year  would  not  only  be  signalized  by  splen 


did  ceremonials  and  magnificent  commemorations  and 
gorgeous  expositions,  but  it  would  go  far  toward  ful 
filling  something  of  the  grandeur  of  that  "  Acceptable 
Year"  which  was  announced  by  higher  than  human  lips, 
and  would  be  the  auspicious  promise  and  pledge  of  a  glo 
rious  second  century  of  Independence  and  Freedom  for 
our  country ! 

For,  if  that  second  century  of  self-government  is  to  go 
on  safely  to  its  close,  or  is  to  go  on  safely  and  prosper 
ously  at  all,  there  must  be  some  renewal  of  that  old 
spirit  of  subordination  and  obedience  to  divine  as  well 
as  human  laws,  which  has  been  our  security  in  the  past. 
There  must  be  faith  in  samething  higher  and  better  than 
ourselves.  There  must  be  a  reverent  acknowledgment  of 
an  Unseen,  but  All-seeing,  All-controlling  Ruler  of  the 
Universe.  His  Word,  His  Day,  His  House,  His  Worship, 
must  be  sacred  to  our  children,  as  they  have  been  to  their 
fathers;  and  His  blessing  must  never  fail  to  be  invoked 
upon  our  land  and  upon  our  liberties.  The  patriot  voice, 
which  cried  from  the  balcony  of  yonder  old  State  House, 
when  the  Declaration  had  been  originally  proclaimed, 
"  Stability  and  perpetuity  to  American  Independence," 
did  not  fail  to  add,  "  God  save  our  American  States."  I 
would  prolong  that  ancestral  prayer.  And  the  last 
phrase  to  pass  my  lips  at  this  hour,  and  to  take  its  chance 
of  remembrance  or  oblivion  in  years  to  come,  as  the  con 
clusion  of  this  Centennial  oration,  and  the  sum  of  all  I 
can  say  to  the  present  or  the  future,  shall  be :  There  is, 
there  can  be  no  independence  of  God;  in  Him,  as  a 
nation,  no  less  than  in  Him,  as  individuals,  "  we  live, 
and  move,  and  have  our  being!"  God  save  our  American 
States ! 


THE     NATIONAL    ODE. 


BY  BAYARD  TAYLOR. 


Delivered  at  Philadelphia,  July  4,  1876. 


I.— 1. 

Sun  of  the  stately  Day, 
Let  Asia  into  the  shadow  drift, 
Let  Europe  bask  in  thy  ripened  ray, 
And  over  the  severing  ocean  lift 
A  brow  of  broader  splendor ! 
Give  light  to  the  eager  eyes 
Of  the  Land  that  waits  to  behold  thee  rise : 
The  gladness  of  morning  lend  her, 
With  the  triumph  of  noon  attend  her, 
And  the  peace  of  the  vesper  skies! 

For  lo!  she  cometh  now 

With  hope  on  the  lip  and  pride  on  the  brow, 
Stronger,  and  dearer,  and  fairer, 
To  smile  on  the  love  we  bear  her, — 
To  live,  as  we  dreamed  her  and  sought  her, 
Liberty's  latest  daughter ! 


In  the  clefts  of  the  rocks,  in  the  secret  places, 

We  found  her  traces ; 
On  the  hills,  in  the  crash  of  woods  that  fall, 

We  heard  her  call ; 
When  the  lines  of  battle  broke, 
We  saw  her  face  in  the  tiery  smoke ; 
Through  toil,  and  anguish,  and  desolation, 

We  followed,  and  found  her 
With  the  grace  of  a  virgin  Nation 
As  a  sacred  zone  around  her ! 
Who  shall  rejoice 
With  a  righteous  voice, 
Far-heard  through  the  ages,  if  not  she? 
For  the  menace  is  dumb  that  defied  her, 

The  doubt  is  dead  that  denied  her, 
And  she  stands  acknowledged,  and  strong  and 
free! 


Independence  Day  Poems,  July  4,  1876. 


II.-l. 

Ah,  hark !  the  solemn  undertone 
n  every  wind  of  human  story  blown. 

A  large,  divinely-moulded  Fate 
Questions  the  right  and  purpose  of  a  State, 

And  in  its  plan  sublime 
Our  eras  are  the  dust  of  Time. 
The  far-off  Yesterday  of  power 

Creeps  back  with  stealthy  feet, 
Invades  the  lordship  of  the  hour, 
Aid  at  our  banquet  takes  the  unbidden  seat. 
From  all  unchronicled  and  silent  ages 
Before  the  Future  first  begot  the  Past, 

Till  History  dared,  at  last, 
To  write  eternal  words  on  granite  pages; 
From  Egypt's  tawny  drift,  and  Assur's  mound, 
And  where,  uplifted  white  and  far, 
Earth  highest  yearns  to  meet  a  star, 
And  Man  his  manhood  by  the  Ganges  found,— 
Imperial  heads,  of  old  millennial  sway, 

And  still  by  some  pale  splendor  crowned, 
Chill  as  a  corpse -light  in  our  full-orbed  day, 

In  ghostly  grandeur  rise 

And  say,  through  stony  lips  and  vacant  eyes : 
"  Thou  that  assertest  freedom,  power  and  fame, 
Declare  to  us  thy  claim !" 

I.-2. 

On  the  shores  of  a  Continent  cast, 

She  won  the  inviolate  soil 
By  loss  of  heirdom  of  all  the  Past, 
And  faith  in  the  royal  right  of  Toil ! 
She  planted  homes  on  the  savage  sod : 
Into  the  wilderness  lone 
She  walked  with  fearless  feet, 
In  her  hand  the  divining-rod, 
Till  the  veins  of  the  mountains  bent 
With  fire  of  metal  and  force  of  stone ! 
She  set  the  speed  of  the  river- head 

To  turn  the  mills  of  her  bread ; 
She  drove  her  plowshare  deep 
Through  the  prairie's  thousand -centuried  sleep ; 
To  the  South,  and  West,  and  North, 
She  called  Pathfinder  forth, 
Her  faithful  and  sole  companion, 
Where  the  flushed  Sierra,  snowy-starred, 

Her  way  to  the  sunset  barred, 
And  the  nameless  rivers  in  thunder  and  foam 
Channeled  the  terrible  canyon ! 
Nor  paused,  till  her  uttermost  home 
Was  built,  in  the  smile  of  a  softer  sky 
And  the  glory  of  beauty  still  to  be, 
Where  the  haunted  waves  of  Asia  die 
On  the  strand  of  the  world-wide  sea ! 

II.-2. 

The  race,  in  conquering, 
Some  fierce  Titanic  joy  of  conquest  knows: 

Whether  in  veins  of  serf  or  king, 
Our  ancient  blood  beats  restless  in  repose. 

Challenge  of  Nature  unsubdued 
Awaits  not  Man's  defiant  answer  long; 

For  hardship,  even  as  wrong, 
Provokes  the  level-eyed,  heroic  mood. 
This  for  herself  she  did ;  but  that  which  lies, 

As  over  earth  the  skies, 
Blending  all  forms  in  one  benignant  glow, — 

Crowned  conscience,  tender  care, 
Justice,  that  answers  every  bondman's  prayer, 
Freedom  where  Faith  may  lead   or  Thought 
may  dare, 

The  power  of  minds  that  know, 

Passion  of  hearts  that  feel, 


Purchased  by  blood  and  woe, 
Guarded  by  fire  and  steel,— 

Hath  she  secured  f    What  blazon  on  her  shield, 
In  the  clear  Century's  light 
Shines  to  the  world  revealed, 

Declaring  nobler  triumph,  born  of  Right1? 

I.— 3. 

Foreseen  in  the  vision  of  sages, 
Foretold  when  martyrs  bled, 

She  was  born  of  the  longing  of  ages, 
By  the  truth  of  the  noble  dead 
And  the  faith  of  the  living  fed! 

No  blood  in  her  lightest  veins 

Frets  at  remembered  chains, 
Nor  shame  of  bondage  has  bowed  her  head. 

In  her  form  and  features  still 

The  unblenching  Puritan  will, 

Cavalier  honor,  Huguenot  grace, 

The  Quaker  truth  and  sweetness, 
And  the  strength  of  the  danger-girdled  race 
Of  Holland,  blend  in  a  proud  completeness. 
From  the  homes  of  all,  where  her  being  began, 

She  took  what  she  gave  to  Man : 

Justice,  that  knew  no  station, 
Belief,  as  soul  decreed, 

Free  air  for  aspiration, 
Free  forne  for  independent  deed ! 

She  takes,  but  to  give  again, 
As  the  sea  returns  the  rivers  in  rain; 
And  gathers  the  chosen  of  her  seed 
From  the  hunted  of  every  crown  and  creed. 
Her  Germany  dwells  by  a  gentler  Rhine; 
Her  Ireland  'sees  the  old  sunburst  shine ; 
Her  France  pursues  some  dream  divine; 
Her  Norway  keeps  his  mountain  pine ; 
Her  Italy  waits  by  the  western  brine ; 

And,  broad-based  under  all, 
Is  planted  England's  oaken-hearted  mood, 

As  rich  in  fortitude 
As  e'er  went  world  ward  from  the  island- wall ! 

Fused  in  her  candid  light, 
To  one  strong  race  all  races  here  unite : 
Tongues  melt  in  hers,  hereditary  foemen 
Forget  their  sword  and  slogan,  kith  and  clan; 

'Twas  glory,  once,  to  be  a  Roman ; 
She  makes  it  glory,  now,  to  be  a  Man! 

II.— 3. 

Bow  down! 
Doff  thine  aeonian  crown ! 

One  hour  forget 
The  glory,  and  recall  the  debt : 

Make  expiation. 

Of  humbler  mood, 
For  the  pride  of  thine  exultation 
O'er  peril  conquered  and  strife  subdued! 
But  half  the  right  is  wrested 

When  victory  yields  her  prize, 
And  half  the  marrow  tested 

When  old  endurance  dies. 
In  the  sight  of  them  tliat  love  thee, 
Bow  to  the  Greater  above  thee ! 

He  faileth  not  to  smite 
The  idle  ownership  of  Right, 
Nor  spares  to  sinews  fresh  from  trial, 
And  virtue  schooled  in  long  denial, 
The  tests  that  wait  for  thee 
In  larger  perils  of  prosperity. 

Here,  at  the  Century's  awful  shrine, 
Bow  to  thy  Fathers'  God— and  thine ! 


The  National  Ode— Bayard  Tayior. 


63 


I.— 4. 


Behold!   she  bendeth  now, 
Humbling  the  chaplet  of  her  hundred  years : 
There  is  a  solemn  sweetness  on  her  brow, 
And  in  her  eyes  are  sacred  tears. 

Can  she  forge.t. 

In  present  joy.  the  burden  of  her  debt, 
When  for  a  captive  race 
She  grandly  staked  and  won 
The  total  promise  or  her  power  begun, 

And  bared  her  bosom's  grace 
To  the  sharp  wound  that  inly  tortures  yet  ? 

Can  she  forget 
The  million  graves  her  young  devotion  set, 

The  hands  that  clasp  above 
From  either  side,  in  sad,  returning  love  ? 

Can  she  forget, 

Here,  where  the  Ruler  of  to-day, 
The  Citizen  of  to-morrow, 
And  equal  thousands  to  rejoice  and  pray 

Beside  these  holy  walls  are  met, 
Her  birth- cry,  mixed  of  keenest  bliss  and  sorrow  I 
Where,  on  July's  immortal  morn 
Held  forth,  the  People  saw  her  head 
And  shouted  to  the  world :   "  The  King  is  dead, 

But  lo !    the  Heir  is  born  !" 
When  fire  of  Youth,  and  sober  trust  of  Age, 
In  Farmer,  Soldier,  Priest  and  Sage, 

Arose  and  cast  upon  her 
Baptismal  garments, — never  robes  so  fair 
Clad  prince  in  Old-world  air, — 
Their  lives,  their   fortunes,   and   their   sacred 
honor ' 

II.— 4. 

Arise!    Re  crown  thy  head, 
Eadiant  with  blessing  of  the  Dead  ! 
Bear  from  this  hallowed  place 
The  prayer  that  purities  thy  lips, 
The  light  or  courage  that  defies  eclipse, 
The  rose  of  Man's  new  morning  on  thy  face  ! 

Let  no  iconoclast 
Invade  thy  rising  Pantheon  of  the  Past, 

To  make  a   blank  where  Adams  stood, 
To  touch  the  Father's  sheathed  and  sacred  blade, 
Spoil  crowns   on  Jefferson  and    Franklin  laid, 
Or  wash  fro  in  Freedom's  feet  the  stain  of  Lin 
coln's  blood  ! 
Hearken,  as  from  that  haunted  hall 

Their  voices  call : 
"  We  lived  and  died  for  thee : 
We  greatly  dared  that  tliou  might'st  be  ; 

So,  from  thy  children  still 
We  claim  denials  which  at  last  fulfill, 
And  freedom  yielded  to  preserve   thee  free! 

Beside  clear-hearted  Right 
That  smiles  at  Power's  uplifted  rod, 

Plant  Duties  that  requite, 
And  Order  that  sustains,  upon  thy  sod, 
And  stand  in  stainless  might 
Above  all  self,  and  only  less  than  God  !  " 

III.-l. 

Here  may  thy  solemn  challenge  end, 
All-proving  Past,  and  each  discordance  die 

Of  doubtful  augury, 

Or  in  one  choral  with  the  Present  blend, 
And  that  half-heard,  sweet  harmony 
Of  something  nobler  that  our  sons  may  see  ! 

Though  poignant  memories  burn 
Of  days  that  were,  and  may  again  return, 
When  thy  fleet  foot,  0  Huntress  of  the  Woods, 
The  slippery  brinks  of  danger  knew, 
And  dim  the  eyesight  grew 


That  was  so  sure  ia  thine  old  solitudes,— 

Yet  stays  some  richer  sense 
Won  from  the  mixture  of  thine  elements, 

To  guide  the  vagrant  scheme, 
And  winnow  truth  from  each  conflicting  dream  ! 

Yet  in  thy  blood  shall  live 
Some  force  unspent,  some  essence  primitive, 
To  seize  the  highest  use  of  things  ; 
For  Fate,  to  mold  thee  to  her  plan, 

Denied  thee  food  of  kings, 
Withheld  the  udder  and  the  orchard-fruits, 

Fed  thee  with  savage  roots, 
And  forced  thy  harsher  milk- from  barren  breasta 
of  man  ! 

III.— 2. 

0  sacred  Woman-Form, 
Of  the  first  People's  need  and  passion  wrought, — 

No  thin,  pale  ghost  of  Thought, 
But  fair  as  Morning  and  as  heart's-blood  warm, — 
Wearing  thy  priestly  tiar  on  Judah's  hills ; 
Clear-eyed  beneath  Athene's  helm  of  gold ; 

Or  from  Rome's  central  seat 
Hearing  the  pulses  of  the  Continents  beat 

In  thunder  where  her  legions  rolled ; 
Compact  of  high  heroic  hearts  and  wills, 

Whose  being  circles  all 
The  selfless  aims  of  men,  and  all  fulfills ; 
Thyself  not  free,  so  long  as  one  is  thrall ; 
Goddess,  that  as  a  Nation  lives, 

And  as  a  Nation  dies, 
That  for  her  children  as  a  man  defies, 
And  to  her  children  as  a  mother  gives, — 

Take  our  fresh  fealty  now ! 
No  more  a  Chieftainess,  with  wainpum-zoaa 

And  feather-cinctured  brow, — 
No  more  a  new  Britannia,  grown 
To  spread  an  equal  banner  to  the  breeze, 
And  lift  thy  trident  o'er  the  double  seas ; 

But  with  unborrowed  crest, 
In  thine  own  native  beauty  dressed, — 
The  front   of  pure  command,  the  unflinching 
eye,  thine  own ! 

III.— 3. 

Look  up,  look  forth,  and  on  ! 

There's  light  in  the  dawning  sky: 
The  clouds  are  parting,  the  night  is  gone : 

Prepare  for  the  work  of  the  day ! 

Fallow  thy  pastures  lie 

And  far  thy  shepherds  stray, 
And  the  fields  of  thy  vast  domain 

Are  waiting  for  purer  seed 

Of  knowledge,  desire,  and  deed, 
For  keener  sunshine  and  mellower  rain  f 

But  keep  thy  garments  pure: 
Pluck  them  back,  with  the  old  disdain, 

From  touch  of  the  hands  that  stain! 

So  shall  thy  strength  endure. 
Transmute  into  good  the  gold  of  Gain, 
CouiDel  to  beauty  thy  ruder  powers, 

Till  the  bounty  of  coining  hours 

Shall  plant,  on  thy  fields  apart, 
With  the  oak  of  Toil,  the  rose  of  Art! 

Be  watchful,  and  keep  us  90: 

Be  strong,  and  fear  no  foe : 

Be  iust,  and  the  world  shall  know ! 
With  the  same  love  love  us,  as  we  give ; 

And  the  day  shall  never  come, 

That  finds  us  weak  or  dumb 

To  join  and  smite  and  cry 
In  the  great  task,  for  thee  to  die*, 
And  the  greater  task,  for- thee  to  live! 


\V 


•    _' 
EBTOtE    TO    THE    NATIONS. 

BY    uLIVEK   WKNDELL  HOLMES. 


J 


Sung  at  Philadelphia,  Jti/v  4. 
I. 

Bright  on  the  banners  of  lily  and  rose 
Lo,  the  last  sun  of  our  century  sets  ! 

Wreath  the  black  cannon  that  scowled  on  oar  foes, 
All  bat  her  friendships  the  Nation  foi_ 
All  but  her  friends  and  their  welcome  forgets! 

These  are  around  her  :  But  where  are  her  foes  ! 
Lo.  while  the  sun  of  her  century  sets 
Peace  with  her  garlands  of  lily  and  rose  I 
IT. 

Welcome  !  a  shout  like  the  war  trumpet  swell 
Wakes  the  wild  echoes  that  slumber  around ! 

Welcome  !  it  quivers  from  Liberty's  bell ; 

Welcome  !  the  walls  of  her  temple  resound  ! 
Hark !  the  gray  walls  of  her  temple  resound ! 

Fade  the  far  voices  o'er  hill-side  and  dell ; 

Welcome  !  still  whisper  the  echoes  around  ; 
Welcome  !  still  trembles  on  Liberty's  bell ! 
III. 

Thrones  of  the  Continents  !    Isles  of  the  Sea  ! 
Yours  are  the  garlands  of  peace  we  entwine ; 

Welcome,  once  more,  to  the  land  of  the  free, 
Shadowed  alike  by  the  palm  and  the  pii,e  : 
Softly  they  murmur,  the  palm  and  the  pine  ; 

Hushed  is  our  strife,  in  the  land  of  the  free  ; " 
Over  your  children  their  branches  entwine, 
Thrones  of  the  Continents  !  Isles  of  the  Sea  ! 


SONG  OF  1876. 

BY  BAYABD  TAYLOR. 

Written  for  the  New- York  Celebration,  July  3.  1876. 
Waken,  voice  of  the  Land's  Devotion  : 

Spirit  of  freedom,  awaken  all ! 
Ring,  ye  shores,  to  the  Song  of  Ocean, 
Rivers,  answer,  and  mountains,  call ! 
The  golden  day  has  come  : 
Let  every  tongue  be  dumb 
That  sounded  its  malice  or  murmured  its  fears ; 
She  hath  won  her  story ; 
She  wears  her  glory ; 

We  crown  her  the  Land  of  a  Hundred  Years  ! 
Out  of  darkness  and  toil  and  danger 
Into  the  light  of  Victory's  day- 
Help  to  the  weak  and  Home  to  the  stranger, 
Freedom  to  all,  she  hath  held  her  way ! 
Now  Europe's  orphans  rest 
Upon  her  mother  breast : 
The  voices  of  nations  are  heard  in  the  cheers 
That  shall  cast  upon  her 
>*ew  love  and  honor, 

And  crown  her  the  Queen  of  a  Hundred  Years'. 
North  and  South,  we  are  met  as  brothers ; 
East  and  West,  we  are  wedded  as  one ! 
Right  of  each  shall  secure  our  mother's— 
Child  of  each  is  her  faithful  son  I 
We  give  thee  heart  and  hand, 
Our  gfcrious  native  land, 
For  battle  has  tri  d  thee,  and  time  endears ; 
We  will  write  thy  story, 
And  keep  thy  glory 
As  pure  as  of  old  for  a  Thousand  Years '. 


ODE. 


BY  WILLIAM  CL'LLEX   BRYANT. 


at  Xt  ic- York,  July  4,  1  ~7'j. 
Through  storin  and  calm  tne  years  have  led 

Our  nation  on  frorn  stage  to  - 
A  century's  space  until  we  tread 

The  threshold  of  another  a^e. 
We  see  there,  o'er  our  pathway  swept, 

A  torrent  stream  of  blood  and  fire ; 
And  thauk  the  ruling  power  who  kept 

Our  sacred  league  of  States  entire. 
Oh  !  checkered  train  of  years,  farewell. 

With  all  thy  strifes  and  hopes  and  fears; 
But  with  us  let  thy  memories  dwell. 

To  warn  and  lead  the  coming  years. 
And  thou.the  new-lie  ginning  age, 

Warned  by  the  past  and  not  ia  vain, 
Write  on  a  fairer,  whiter  page 

The  record  of  thy  happier  reign. 


CENTENNIAL    HYMN. 


BY  JOHN'  G.  WtriTTIER. 


(Sung  at  the  Optning  of  the  Czntennixl  Exhibition,   May  10, 

1876.) 

Our  fathers'  God !  from  out  whose  hand 
TUP  centuries  fall  like  grains  of  sand, 
We  meet  to-day,  united,  free, 
And  loyal  to  our  land  and  Thee, 
To  thank  Thee  for  the  era  done, 
And  trust  Thee  for  the  opening  one. 
Here,  where  of  old,  by  Thy  design, 
The  fathers  spake  that  word  of  Thine, 
Whose  echo  is  the  glad  refrain 
Of  rended  bolt  and  falling  chain, 
To  grace  our  festal  time,  from  all 
The  zones  of  earth  our  guest*  we  calL 
Be  with  us  while  the  new  world  greeU 
The  old  world  thronging  all  its  streets* 
Un vailing  all  the  triumphs  won 
By  art  or  toll  beneath  the  sun ; 
And  unto  common  good  ordain 
This  rivalship  of  hand  and  brain. 
Thou,  who  host  here  in  concord  furled 
The  war  flags  of  a  gathered  world, 
Beneath  our  Western  skies  fulfill 
The  Orient's  mission  of  good  will, 
And,  freighted  with  love's  Golden  Fleeoe, 
Send  back  the  Argonauts  of  peace. 
For  art  and  labor  met  in  trace, 
For  beauty  made  the  bride  of  use 
We  thank  Thee,  while,  withal,  we  crave 
The  austere  virtues  strong  to  save, 
The  honor  proof  to  place  or  gold. 
The  manhood  never  bought  nor  sold ! 
O !  make  Thou  us,  through  centuries  lone; 
In  peace  secure,  injustice  strong  ; 
Around  our  gift  of  freedom  draw 
The  safeguards  of  Thy  righteous  law ; 
And,  caet  in  some  diviner  mold, 
Let  the  n«w  cycle  shame  the  old ! 


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